WEATHERFORD, Okla. – After honoring a large senior class prior to Saturday's games, the SWOSU Baseball team took care of business and picked up a sweep of their arch rival Northwestern Oklahoma State. The Bulldogs improve to 32-13 on the year and 21-8 in GAC play heading into the final conference game of the season.
SWOSU and Northwestern will conclude their three-game series on Sunday afternoon at 1:00 pm from the Athletic Complex.
SWOSU 3, Northwestern Oklahoma State 1
Box Score
Jon Chidester pitched a gem in his final regular season start at the Athletic Complex. Honored before the game with the rest of the SWOSU Baseball Senior Class, Chidester tossed a complete game and allowed six hits while striking out 13 Rangers, one of his career-high set two weeks ago at Arkansas Tech.
Northwestern got four hits in the first three innings, but Chidester held the Rangers without a hit for the next four frames while SWOSU built their lead. The Dawgs got on the board with an RBI single from
Joshua Santos in the third inning, scoring
Haden Houska for the 1-0 lead after three. The remainder of the offense came in the fourth inning, when
Jacob Spring led off the inning with a double and scored on an RBI double from
Justin Freeman.
CJ Faddis was the next batter up and hit a high pop up into shallow left field, but the Rangers defense was unable to get to it and Spring scored to make it 3-0.
Pitching took over in the middle innings as neither team recorded a hit in the fifth, sixth or seventh inning and SWOSU maintained a 3-0 lead heading into the eighth. Northwestern got back-to-back singles to lead off the eighth and scored their lone run on a sacrifice fly later in the inning, but Chidester got a strikeout to end the threat with a runner on second.
SWOSU was unable to get anything going in the bottom of the eighth, but Chidester had enough run support and he struck out the first two batters of the ninth before getting a groundout to end the game. Both teams totaled six hits in the contest, with Faddis the lone Bulldog with two base hits in the contest.
Chidester (8-4) threw his fourth complete-game of the season, allowing six hits and one earned run in 9.0 innings of work. He was one strikeout off his career high with 13, his third game this season with more than 10 strikeouts.
SWOSU 7, Northwestern Oklahoma State 4
Box Score
SWOSU scored in each of the first four innings and added two insurance runs in the bottom of the sixth inning to hold off the Rangers and earn the doubleheader sweep. Northwestern threw the first punch, getting an RBI single in the top of the first to score one run, but they left two on base as
Devin Ring got a strikeout to end the inning.
The Bulldogs quickly responded with
Tanner Dearman and
Korbin Polston getting on with singles in the bottom of the first and both runners coming in to score on a fielding error by the Rangers first baseman. Polston then drew a bases-loaded walk in the bottom of the second to make it 3-1. In the third,
Joel Baxley singled and came in to score on a sac fly from Faddis and Dearman's aggression to steal third base forced another Ranger error and he scored in the fourth give the Dawgs a 5-1 advantage.
Northwestern did not go quietly, finally getting to Ring at the start of the fifth inning. Ring left with one out in the inning and two runners on, but the Rangers got two RBI hits off of reliever
Ben Schweinfurth and got within one at 5-4. SWOSU was held at bay in the fifth inning and
Quinton Dougherty came on to close out the sixth inning with the Dawgs still holding on to a 5-4 advantage.
Faddis took the first pitch of the bottom of the sixth inning to deep right center, hustling his way all the way around the bases for an inside the park home run that turned the momentum back to the Bulldogs.
Joshua Santos later double down the left field line and scored on an RBI single from Polston for an extra insurance run that made it 7-4. Dougherty recorded a three-pitch strikeout and got two groundouts to end the game and earn the save.
Ring (6-3) earned the win after striking out seven while allowing three hits on four runs over 4.1 innings of work. Dougherty claimed his sixth save of the season by retiring all four batters he faced.
