Saturday – At a Glance: There are four teams still alive at the Decatur, Illinois NCAA Baseball Regional and Saturday will prove to be a pivotal day in determining who will be sitting in the catbird seat and who will be trying to battle out of the losers bracket. Denison (25-11) and WashU (30-3) are the only 2-0 teams left in the regional and they will square off at 3:30 p.m. EDT (2:30 CDT) at Workman Family Field. The winner will advance to Sunday's regional championship. The loser of the Denison-WashU game will play the winner of the Webster-Transylvania contest at 7 p.m. EDT (6 p.m. CDT) in an elimination game.
How to Watch: Millikin University is providing a live video stream for all games at this year's regional tournament.
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How We Got Here: Denison opened the regional with a 4-0 victory over the host, Millikin University, on Thursday behind a complete game, three-hit shutout by
Charlie Fleming. Friday brought colder temperatures and rain to Decatur forcing some delays in the early games. The Denison-Webster game didn't start until 9:45 p.m. EDT and ended a touch before 1 a.m. EDT but that didn't phase the Big Red.
Taylor Perrett held the No. 3 ranked Gorlocks scoreless until the seventh inning and the Denison offense chipped away with five bunt base hits, two sacrifice bunts, three sac flies and a exhale-inducing solo home run from
Dylan Hunter on the second pitch of the game en route to an 8-1 victory.
Scouting WashU: The Washington University-St. Louis Bears entered the NCAA Regional as the No. 1 ranked team in the D3baseball.com Top 25 poll. They bring a 30-3 record into today's game against Denison with their only losses coming to Buena Vista (twice) and Webster. WashU has won nine straight dating back to April 25. The Bears have started Mitchell Black (4-0, 2.25 ERA) and Ryan Loutos (11-1, 1.26 ERA) so far. Today's projected starter is senior right-hander Troy Bauer (5-2, 3.02 ERA, 74 Ks, 50.2 IP). Second baseman Tim Van Kirk leads the offense with a .414 batting average. His speed is a game-changer. He has 21 stolen bases and has legged out a team-high five triples. The shortstop, Caleb Durbin, is batting .370 with five home runs, 14 doubles and 36 RBI. This team loves to run. They lead all teams at the regional with 86 stolen bases. The pitching staff boasts the nation's best ERA at 1.97. The back end is anchored by Jared Fong who leads the nation with 10 saves.
Bears head coach Pat Bloom is in his sixth season at WashU. Since arriving he has taken the Bears to four NCAA Regionals in five tries (no postseason in 2020). Before WashU he spent 12 years as the head coach at Wisconsin-Stevens Point where he went 393-175 (.692) with four World Series appearances and eight conference titles.
Scouting Denison: After two tremendous starts by
Charlie Fleming and
Taylor Perrett on the mound the Big Red is expected to turn to junior left-hander
Will McManaman in today's tilt with WashU. McManaman is 3-2 with a 4.38 ERA in eight starts. Omit his one bad outing against Wooster on March 27 (2.1 IP, 7 ER), and McManaman would lead the team with a 2.95 ERA. In his six starts since that appearance he hasn't allowed more than three earned runs. In Denison's two regional games
Danny Alvarez leads the offense with a .571 batting average (4-for-7) with two doubles and three RBI.
Daniel Spencer and
Ty Robinson are both batting .429 (3-for-7). Denison has used only three pitchers in two games and the trio boasts a 0.50 ERA with 21 strikeouts, four walks and 13 hits surrendered in 18.0 IP.
