BELLEVUE, Neb. -- Bruin southpaw Blake Crippen needed just 100 pitches to earn a 6-3 complete game victory over Oklahoma City University on Tuesday afternoon and send the top-seeded Bellevue University baseball team to the Championship Game of the NAIA National Tournament Opening Round – Bellevue Bracket.
Bellevue's first four batters all reached as the Bruins grabbed a 1-0 lead without the ball leaving the infield. Nick Grade drew a bases loaded walk and Anthony Lind reached on a fielder's choice later in the frame to chase home a second run and stake the Bruins to a 2-0 lead.
The Stars scratched across a run in the second on a fielding error with Trent Kiraly scoring the first run.
A failed pickoff play and a suicide squeeze by CJ Townsend pushed the Bruin lead to three runs, 4-1, in the top of the fourth.
Primarily pitching to contact, Crippen (10-2) dialed up a little extra when needed striking out six OCU hitters. He scattered six hits while his only real mistake came on a pitch he left up to Felix Chenier-Rondeau in the bottom half.
With BU holding a one-run lead, Mathieu Sirois put a charge into a ball in the seventh but the win held it up at the warning track in center field.
Chad Pike drew a leadoff walk in the bottom of the seventh and advanced to third on a failed pickoff attempt with one out. Crippen averted damage by inducing a fly ball to right and a ground out.
A 1-2-3 eighth by Crippen brought the Bruins to bat in the ninth. Back-to-back one-out doubles in the ninth from Logan Grant and Nick Grade provided an insurance run. A strikeout had OCU starter Tyler Polk one out away from getting out of the inning but Polk hit Lind – the fourth HBP of the game from the Stars' right-hander – and Oklahoma City turned to their bullpen.
Cole Sedgewick came on and Jake Lacey greeted him with a single through the hole on the left side to score Grade as Bellevue took a 6-3 lead into the bottom of the ninth
Crippen got a fly ball before pinch-hitter Noah Kang reached when his line drive caromed off Drew Staley's glove and nose. The unfortunate break proved uncostly as Crippen popped up Pike and induced Hunter Lenochan to ground out to Townsend to end the game.
Of note, the game was Bellevue's first at home against OCU after 45 road games and three neutral site contests, two of which came in World Series play (1998, 2003).
Bellevue will be appearing in the Opening Round Championship Game for the eighth time in the past nine seasons.
Up Next:
The Bruins await the winner of tomorrow's elimination game between OCU and Doane with the championship game scheduled for a 3:30 p.m. start. The OCU-Doane winner would need to defeat BU twice while the Bruins are just one win from a return trip to Lewiston.
