SOMERS, Wis. – The Parkside baseball team finished out a nice weekend at Red Oberbruner Field in team's home opening series, as the Rangers earned another split of a tough Bellarmine squad on Sunday. Parkside fell in game one 5-1 and came back to win game two 5-4.
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In game one, the Rangers got a good start out of
Connor Cunningham, who went all 7.0 innings allowing three earned runs with a pair of strikeouts, but the Knights were able to mash out 11 hits. Bellarmine scored a run in the top of the second inning and two in each the fifth and seventh innings.
The Rangers made it interesting in the end, plating a run in the bottom of the sixth thanks to a
Troy Bittenbender home run, his second of the season, to make it 3-1 at the time.
Domenic Hammudeh went 2-for-3 in the three spot while Bittenbender finished 1-for-3 with the home run.
In game two,
Hunter Weddel earned his first career win on the mound for the Rangers, as the freshman went 7.0 innings allowing four earned runs with two strikeouts after throwing well over 100 pitches.
Parkside jumped out the early lead in game two, scoring two runs in the bottom of the first after capitalizing on a throwing error by third base that helped Hammudeh and Weddel each score.
Nick Sramek made it 3-0 in the bottom of the third with an RBI single, but Bellarmine responded with three runs in the fourth inning to tie it up.
The Rangers didn't stay tied long, as the team manufactured a pair of runs in the bottom of the fifth.
Max Widmar scored Weddel on a sacrifice fly and Hammudeh came in to score after stealing third and moving up to home on a throwing error.
The combination of
Jake Macaluso going 1.1 innings after Hammudeh going the final 0.2 innings to earn the save helped the Rangers to the win.
Freshman
Cole Vento went 2-for-4 at the plate for his first career hit while Sramek went 1-for-3 with two RBI and Weddel went 1-for-4 with two runs.
Parkside will hit the road for the next two weekends, going at Lewis next weekend before heading to face Illinois-Springfield.