Cortland Standard .net

By ALAN BUTLER
Sports Editor
AUBURN — Finding a way to win was the crucial post-season trick the SUNY Cortland baseball team pulled off on this chilly Wednesday afternoon.
Despite being out-hit, despite not being all that sure-handed in the field while committing three errors, the top-seeded Red Dragons were still able to come up with a 6-4 victory over Oberlin College to get this eight-team, double-elimination NCAA Division III New York Regional underway.
Scoring three times in the bottom of the eighth inning saved this opening day for Cortland, Vinny Bomasuto and Anthony Simon singling home the crucial runs to snatch an upset victory away from the eighth seeds out of Ohio.
“That’s why you don’t look at records in a tournament,” said Cortland coach Joe Brown, whose squad now stands an impressive 37-4 on the season while Oberlin falls further under .500 at 18-27. “That team can hit. That team just had 10 hits off a real good pitcher.”
That real good pitcher would be Brandon Serio. Though Cortland’s junior right-hander and SUNY Athletic Conference Pitcher of the Year whiffed eight batters, he also yielded those 10 bases hits — including four Yeomen doubles — before being lifted two batters into the eighth inning trailing 4-3.
After reliever Adam Brant got out of the top of the eighth inning picking a runner off first before center fielder Conrad Ziemendorf ran down a ball hit into the gap for the third out, the Red Dragons staged their decisive rally.
Leadoff man Mark DeMilio walked on four pitches and Ziemendorf was hit by a pitch that would have been ball four to get things started against Yeomen reliever Milo Sklar. Bomasuto ripped an RBI single to center to tie things up at 4-4, and Simon followed with a base hit into left to bring home the go-ahead run. An Oberlin error on Adam Smith’s grounder enabled Bomasuto to cross the plate with an insurance run.
“We came through when the time called for it,” said senior shortstop Simon. “I was looking for something down, and he left one up. That’s about it. But I wouldn’t be able to do that without my teammates. It all got done because my teammates put me in that situation.”
That keeps Cortland — the only higher seeded team to prevail on Wednesday — in the winner’s bracket to face Amherst College out of Massachusetts at 4:30 p.m. this afternoon back at Auburn’s Falcon Park. Fifth-seed Amherst out-lasted Oswego 7-5 in 11 innings in the first of four regional games played yesterday.
After Cortland’s escape, sixth-seed Rensselear blanked Pennsylvania’s Keystone College 2-0 and seventh-seed Old Westbury topped Ohio’s Baldwin Wallace 7-5 in the late, late show.
CORTLAND GRABBED an early 3-0 lead as Oberlin starting left-hander Kyle Dominy (6-1) walked five of the first nine batters he faced. That enabled first baseman Austin Clock to hit a bases loaded sacrifice fly in the first frame, while Ziemendorf singled home two more Red Dragons in the second.
That would be all the runs the Red Dragons could muster until the eighth inning, however, as Dominy settled down.
Back-to-back Jeff Schwighoffer and Kyle Decker singles and an error delivered an Oberlin run in the third inning, a two-run double by clean-up hitter Benjamin Whitener tied things at 3-3 in the fifth, and doubles off the bats of Ryan Bliss and Blaise Dolcemaschio put the North Coast Athletic Conference playoff champions ahead in the sixth.
“We held it well,” said Simon of how the Red Dragons responded to that challenge. “The guys knew we just had to win the last three innings and that’s what we did. We came out and won those last three innings.”
Once the lead arrived, Bryant retired Oberlin in order in the ninth to pick up the mound win. He was helped by two defensive plays at third base from DeMilio, who was moved from his usual second base spot because of a calf injury that knocked Patrick Schetter out of the game, before Simon snared a line drive to end the game.
“There are no bad teams here. Any team can do it,” said Coach Brown, who will now be facing Amherst for the third consecutive season in regional play. “We caught lightning there in that last (eighth) inning. They brought their sidearmer in and I thought out guys did a really nice job hitting him.”
CORTLAND FINISHED with just seven hits, led by Ziemendorf going 2-for-4 with a double — the Red Dragons lone extra-base hit.
“I think that’s a prime example of we haven’t played in nine days,” said Brown, whose team won the SUNYAC tournament back on May 3. Cortland did lose to St. John Fisher a week ago in a game that had more of a scrimmage feel to it as Coach Brown gave nine different pitchers mound work.
“We came out, and the only reason we scored early is he walked guys,” added Brown. “We weren’t hitting exceptionally well, so I think our players stepped up and I thought our guys did a nice job hitting him. At this junction, whoever you play is going to battle you because you have 18-to-22 year old guys just getting beat down psychologically and you just have to hand in there. I give our guys a lot of credit.”