Senior Mike Bassett’s 51st homerun in Tuesday’s loss broke GW’s all-time career record, and his 52nd homer in Wednesday’s win improved his total.
Tuesday’s 9-8 loss off a ninth-inning homerun snapped the GW baseball team’s seven-game winning streak. Bassett knocked in a two-run homerun, breaking the record he shared with Joe Beichert for three days. Blast No. 52 came in an 8-7 winning effort against visiting Norfolk State Wednesday, a game that saw reliever Chris Worth earn his first win.
It has been a record-breaking season for Bassett, who has homered in four of his last five games. In 30 games this season, the outfielder added to his career record for total bases (438) and RBIs (215) and now sits atop both those categories on GW’s all-time lists.
Bassett’s 52nd home run, his ninth this season, was just one of four GW homeruns Wednesday that produced all runs in the 8-7 win over the Spartans at Barcroft Park. His first-inning blast over the right field fence knocked in junior Jake Wald and put GW ahead 3-1.
Three other Colonials would homer allowing GW to preserve a lead into the late innings. After the Spartans re-claimed a 4-3 lead in the second inning, GW freshman Ryan Roberson tied the game at four with a solo shot. Krimmel and Jeff Fertitta each hit two-run homeruns that gave GW four extra runs for an 8-3 lead by the end of the third inning.
The Spartans added three runs, but the GW bullpen, bolstered by Shaun Frasier, Nick Koken and Mike O’Connor kept the Spartans scoreless through the seventh, eighth and ninth innings. Worth (2-3), who relieved GW starter Avi Rasowsky, allowed one earned run and four hits in two innings pitched.
The day prior Delaware State handed GW a 9-8 loss at Soldier Field.
The game yo-yoed, with three lead changes, including Malkum King’s solo shot in the bottom of the ninth to win it for the Hornets. GW had four homeruns of their own, including Bassett’s two-run shot in the fifth that broke 1999 graduate Beichert’s record.
Anthony Raglani knocked a two-run homer off Hornets pitcher Nathan Babcock that tied the game at eight at the top of the ninth. Raglani’s shot scored Jake Wald, who was on first with a lead-off bunt down the left field line.
But Delaware took advantage of its last at bat. After GW reliever Justin Orenduff struck out the first batter of the inning, King hit the game-winning homerun for the win. It was Orenduff’s only run allowed in 4 1/3 innings of work.
The Colonials, who played three games at Dayton this weekend, were the first on the scoreboard when junior Chris Barry knocked a two-run shot to left field, scoring Wald, who had walked, and Matt Krimmel, who had been hit by a pitch.
