Home opener is un-Poetic as Panthers drop a pair

ORANGE, Calif. – The shine on a brand new baseball season and a sparkling debut on Friday were tarnished in a matter of 18 innings on Saturday. The Chapman University baseball team dropped both ends of a doubleheader to visiting Whittier College 2-1 and 6-4 at Hart Park in the Panthers' home opener.

With the victories, the Poets took the three-game series for the second time in three seasons. Chapman had won Game 1 of the series in Whittier on Friday 7-1 on a one-hitter by the Panthers' pitching staff.

Whittier 2, Chapman 1
Whittier (3-1) senior IF Dan Gleiberman snapped a 1-1 tie with a two-out, RBI single in the eighth inning to provide the difference in the first game of the double-dip. The run came off Chapman sophomore RHP Travis McGee who was saddled with the tough-luck loss, surrendering just two runs and eight hits over eight innings and adding eight strikeouts.

McGee had some good and bad luck over the eight innings. The good luck came in the first inning after he allowed a pair of singles to begin the game. Gleiberman lined a hit-and-run ball into right field that the Panthers turned into a 9-6-3 triple play. However, the bad luck came three innings later when junior IF Cory Goodchild hit a sinking line drive to center and it bounced just out of the reach of a diving Steve Greenberg. The ball rolled to the fence and Goodchild legged it out for an inside-the-park home run, giving the Poets a 1-0 lead in the fourth.

Chapman (1-2) responded with a run of its own in the bottom of the inning when McGee plated senior C Adam Kordich with an RBI ground out tying it at 1-1. But that was all the offense the Panthers could muster with just two hits in the game.

Whittier 6, Chapman 4
The Panthers saw a 2-0 first inning lead evaporate when the Poets pushed across four runs in the fourth and two more in the fifth to take a 6-2 advantage. Whittier collected 12 hits in the game, including nine off Chapman senior RHP Jordan Sigman who allowed six runs in five innings. Senior OF Alex Gast had the crushing blow for the Poets in the fourth inning, clearing the bases with three-run double. Gast went 3-for-3 with five RBI.

Chapman scratched across a run in the sixth and another in the eighth on an RBI double from sophomore OF James Parr, but could not rally to earn the doubleheader split. Kordich went 3-for-3 with a two-run first-inning single to give the Panthers an early lead. Parr reached base four times (two hits, two walks) in five plate appearances.

Panthers' relievers Christian Maietta and Kyle Tachibana were solid, allowing just three singles and no runs in four innings.

by Doug Aiken
Sports Information Director

Boxscores
Game 1: http://www.chapmanathletics.com/sports/bsb/2010-11/boxscores/20110205_txgn.xml
Game 2: http://www.chapmanathletics.com/sports/bsb/2010-11/boxscores/20110205_8rfn.xml