Purdue Fort Wayne
Oral Roberts
IPFW Manhandled at ORU
4/5/2009 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
April 5, 2009
Tulsa, OK - J.L. Johnson Stadium in Tulsa, Oklahoma turned out to be a house of horrors for IPFW this weekend. The Mastodons were swept in their Summit League opening series by the Oral Roberts Golden Eagles. Sunday's series finale went to the hosts, 26-3.
The first four innings of the game turned out to be a close affair. Oral Roberts did break out to a 3-0 in the bottom of the first and got solo home runs from left fielder Danny Duffy in the second and catcher Seth Furmanek in the third to take a 5-0 lead.
IPFW cut that lead to 5-2 in the top of the fourth inning on a two-run blast by Mastodon first baseman Shaun VanDriessche. It was the New Haven native's third home run of the season.
But from there it all went horribly wrong for the 'Dons. Oral Roberts got one back in the bottom of the fourth and scored 10 runs in each the 5th and 6th innings to put the game on ice.
IPFW got one back in the eighth on an RBI double by VanDriessche, but it was way too little too late as the Mastodons suffered their worst defeat of the season.
Furmanek drove in six runs on the afternoon for Oral Roberts (12-8, 4-0 SL). He also had a 3-run homer in the 6th inning. The Golden Eagles pounded out 23 hits in the contest.
VanDriessche and shortstop Chris Gottschall each had two hits for the Mastodons who fell to 7-18 overall and 0-4 in conference play with the loss.
The good new for the Mastodons is that they will return home for an 11-game homestand, beginning with a non-conference rematch with Butler University on Wednesday at 3:00 p.m.
IPFW returns to Summit League play on Friday, beginning a four-game set with Southern Utah.
~Dons~
