May 30, 2017 4 min read

APPLETON, Wis. – The Washington & Jefferson College baseball team moved to within one game of winning the NCAA Division III baseball title Monday afternoon.

And if that win was any indication, the Presidents appear in great shape to wrap up the title today.

Matt Heslin, a Fort Cherry graduate, pitched an outstanding game and the W&J bats produced 12 hits in a 12-2 rout of Cal Lutheran in this best-of-three championship series at Fox Cities Stadium in Appleton, Wis.

The two teams meet at noon with Cal Lutheran facing a must-win situation. A third game, if necessary, in this series would follow at a time not yet determined.

Heslin went nine innings, spreading nine hits. He didn’t walk or strike out a batter.

“I’m not a strikeout pitcher. I also don’t walk many,” said Heslin. “I knew they were an aggressive team. They swing early, so I threw a two-seam fastball that has a little tail to it. I get a lot of ground balls. I trust my fielder and they made the plays and kept us in the game.”

Despite the margin of victory, W&J head coach Jeff Mountain was unhappy with the Presidents committing four errors. Cal Lutheran committed three errors and allowed three unearned runs.

“It was probably not what you would expect to see in a best-of-three Division III World Series game,” Mountain said. “We competed well, played with a lot of poise. Matt is also a football player at W&J. I think being a part of that program helped him getting into a situation like today. He battled, went nine innings and allowed us to rest our bullpen.”

The W&J offense scored a run in each of the first two innings, then erupted for two in the fourth, three in the fifth, one in the eighth and four in the ninth.

“Wow. That’s about all I can say right there,” said Cal Lutheran head coach Marty Slimak, who is in his 22nd season. “Give all the credit to Washington & Jefferson. They did a great job of taking the game away from us. … I told our guys they didn’t crown a national champion. You have to win two games, so we have to win two games (today). We’ll show better (in Game 2).”

Cal Lutheran had opportunities but couldn’t push a run across until the Kingsmen scored twice in the bottom of the sixth.

“We knew we had a ground ball pitcher on the mound,” Mountain said of Heslin. “He didn’t strike anybody out but that’s fine. We want him to pitch to contact and we recorded 27 outs from the defense.”

Third baseman Kevin Begley keyed the Presidents’ offensive attack by going 3-for-5 and driving in four runs. But the odd offensive stat of the day went to shortstop Nick Gatins, who went 0-for-3 but drove in three runs. He had a sacrifice fly in the first to bring in Adam LaRue, who had a game-opening walk. Gatins drove in LaRue again, this time in the three-run fifth inning the same way: sacrifice fly. The two struck again in the four-run ninth, with LaRue scoring on Gatins fielder’s choice.

LaRue had two hits and scored three times in four at-bats. Center fielder Ryan Sciullo went 2-for-3, scored three times and knocked in two runs. DH Jake Gordon went 2-for-4 with a run and RBI and first baseman Mark Merlino scored twice.

“I think we’re still OK,” said Slimak. “We’ve been playing very well. … Obviously, you don’t want to see this but if we come out and play better defensively and step up to the dish, we’ll be OK.”