PHOTO GALLERY

CHILLICOTHE, Ohio (May 9, 2024) – The No. 2 nationally-ranked and second-seeded Denison University baseball team started its quest for a fifth straight North Coast Athletic Conference Tournament title with a 10-2 win over third-seeded DePauw University in the first game of the 2024 tournament at VA Memorial Stadium. In the win, the Big Red hit five home runs, including four two-run home runs, two of which came courtesy of junior Eric Colaco.

After DePauw's Louis Florida led off the game with a solo home run to right field, Denison answered in the bottom of the first with a pair of two-run blasts by Colaco and Jake Welsch, going to right center and left field, respectively.

Up 5-2 going into the bottom of the fourth inning, Cade Nowik led off with a solo homer to left center, and then after seeing Denison's No. 2 and No. 4 hitters both go yard in the first inning, the No. 3 hitter, Noah Leib, got into the action with a two-out, two-run shot to right center field to make it 8-2 Big Red.

Colaco put the finishing touches on the scoring with a two-run line drive home run to center field in the bottom of the sixth inning.

Colaco was 3-for-4 with four RBI's, three runs scored, two home runs and a double.

Leib was 3-for-4 with three runs scored, two RBI's, a home run and a double, and finished a triple shy of hitting for the cycle.

Nowik, Erik Sundgren and Alex Vasquez each finished with two hits as the Big Red finished with 14 hits as a team.

Starting pitcher Will Rettig pitched four innings allowing four hits, two runs, three walks and five strikeouts before Michael Gray (3-0) tossed the next two innings allowing one hit, no runs and one walk to pick up the win.

Ryan Starr, Manny Nager and Robbie Lee helped finish off a pitching effort that saw the Big Red bullpen shut out the Tigers for the final five innings of the game.

It was a highly-anticipated matchup between a high-powered Denison offense and one of the strongest pitchers in the NCAC this season in DePauw's Michael Vallone (7-1). Vallone was 7-0 with a 1.83 ERA, 0.87 WHIP, two complete games and 76 strikeouts in 54.0 innings pitched this season, and recently broke the NCAC's career strikeout record. Vallone, however, ended up with four innings pitched allowing nine hits and eight earned runs against the Big Red.

Denison improved to 36-5 overall while DePauw fell to 23-16. Denison will now play top-seeded Wittenberg University, which defeated fourth-seeded Kenyon College by a score of 6-2 in the first game of the tournament. The battle between Denison and Wittenberg, who shared this year's NCAC regular-season championship, will begin at 11 a.m. on Friday, May 10, with the winner earning a one-way ticket straight into the championship game.