With their backs against the wall, the East Carolina Pirates came out firing to eliminate Cornell from the NCAA Tournament 10-6.
“They knew, we talked about it before the game, that it’s a one game season, ECU head coach Billy Godwin said. “You don’t have to be very smart to figure that out. I could see it in their eyes as we were talking after our pregame preparation that they didn’t want this to be over and they wanted to go out and fight.”
East Carolina designated hitter Drew Reynolds kick started the offense with a solo homerun over the right field fence in the top of the third inning. The Pirates followed that up by adding on another run in the fourth as Zach Wright scored from second on a Jack Reinheimer single down the left field line.
“It’s always good to come out here and perform well, especially offensively because we struggled a little bit yesterday,” Reynolds said. “We rebounded a little bit towards the end of the game and strung some hits together to score at the end of the game yesterday.”
But Cornell turned up the heat in the bottom of the fourth.
The Big Red’s leading hitter Brian Billigen led off the inning with a single and Chris Cruz was hit by a pitch in the next at bat. First baseman Frank Hager tried to sacrifice by laying down a bunt but an error by ECU pitcher Kevin Brandt loaded up the bases.
The Big Red came up with three singles in the next four at bats to take the 3-2 lead and notched another run as Brandt plunked his second batter of the inning.
The Pirates very quickly regained the lead as they also took advantage of a botched play on a sacrifice bunt. Reynolds scored for the second time on the day as Cornell allowed Jack Wooten to reach first on a bunt attempt. Corey Thompson, who advanced to third on Wooten’s bunt, scored in the next play as Jay Cannon grounded out.
Wright flew out deep enough to right to score Wooten and gave the Pirates the lead back 5-4. By the end of the inning ECU added on another pair of runs to lead 7-4.
