Louisville baseball: Bullpen shines in sweep against Dayton

This past weekend the Louisville baseball team hosted the Dayton Flyers on their home field at Jim Patterson Stadium. Louisville had a stranglehold on Dayton for the entire series, outscoring the Flyers 22-10 en route to a successful sweep. Here is a brief recap of each game.

Game 1: LOU 11, DAY 7

Game one resulted in a Louisville win over Dayton, 11-7. It also marked the 700th career win for Louisville Head Coach Dan McDonnell. An impressive milestone for an incredible coach and a team that has only dropped one game all season. In this matchup, the Cardinals may have given most viewers a scare at the beginning, but they were able to grind through it to get the win for their head coach.

Ryan Hawks started on the bump day one and had a slow start. Hawks allowed five of the eight hits in his appearance in the first two innings. The junior right-hander showed why he is the ace by being able to battle through and stay in the game until the sixth inning before he was relieved by his bullpen. Despite the five earned runs he gave up in the first two innings, he was able to keep the Flyers lineup quiet after that.

The lineup for the Cardinals was silent until the fifth inning, when the bats exploded and they put up nine runs on the scoreboard. Logan Beard led off with a single followed by Christian Knapcyzk being hit by a pitch. Jack Payton struck first for the Cardinals by driving in Beard.

Then, the flyers pitching staff struggled by walking in two runs and rotating in three different pitchers in that single inning. Jack Payton had two at bats in the inning totaling three RBIs, Gavin Kilen and Eddie King Jr. were able to record RBIs during as well. The all-out bat explosion by the Cardinals tripled the number of outs that Dayton needed just to get out of that inning.

Evan Webster closed the game out with a three inning save, striking out three in 3.2 innings pitched. Webster allowed two unearned runs due to an error in the outfield, which allowed runners on-base to advance and brought us to the final score of 11-7.