FERRUM, Va. — The Wittenberg baseball team closed its three-game series at Ferrum with an 8-5 win on Sunday.

The Basics

• Records: Wittenberg (2-1 overall), Ferrum (2-4 overall)
• Venue: Panther Field - Ferrum, Va.
• Sunday's game was the third in a three-game series between Wittenberg and Ferrum. On Saturday, Ferrum won the opener 14-10, and Wittenberg won 13-4 in the second game.

Stat Leaders

• Seven Tigers tallied two hits each on the day.
• Senior Matt Moore (Wadsworth, Ohio/Wadsworth) led the Wittenberg offense with two hits, including a home run, to go with three RBIs and two runs scored.
• Junior Ben Seibert (Cincinnati, Ohio/LaSalle) added two hits, three RBIs and a stolen base.
• Freshman Thatcher Dietz (Westerville, Ohio/South) finished with two hits, including his first career home run, to go with two RBIs and one run.
• Senior Conor O'Malley (Avon, Ohio/St. Edward's) posted two hits, including a double, and scored three runs.
• Senior Luke Thomas (Tallmadge, Ohio/Tallmadge), sophomore James MacAuley (Grosse Pointe Woods, Mich./Grosse Pointe North) and freshman Xander Rodriguez (Salinas, P.R./Franklin County) also had two hits each.
• Senior Austin Luther (Hughesville, Md./St. Mary's Ryken) got the pitching start for the Tigers and allowed four runs, two of which were earned, on five hits and three walks while striking out four over five innings.
• Sophomore Mikey Eickhoff (Akron, Ohio/St. Vincent-St. Mary) earned the win in relief, pitching four innings and allowing one run on three hits and one walk while striking out three.
• Benjamin Thomas led the Ferrum offense with three hits and one RBI.

The Game

• Wittenberg opened the scoring with a three-run homer from Moore in the top of the first inning. That marked his first home run of the season and fifth of his career.
• The Panthers responded with a run in the bottom of the first and added three more in the fifth for a 4-3 lead.
• A solo homer from Dietz tied the score at 4-all in the top of the sixth.
• The Tigers added two more runs in the seventh, getting an RBI sac fly from Seibert and an RBI single from Dietz.
• Wittenberg increased its lead to 8-4 courtesy of Seibert's 2-RBI single in the top of the eighth.
• Ferrum hit a leadoff single in the bottom of the eighth, but Eickhoff got the next batter to ground into a double play and struck out the next batter to end the inning.
• The Panthers led off the bottom of the ninth with back-to-back singles and ended up plating a run on a fielder's choice two batters later but were unable to get any closer.
• Wittenberg out-hit Ferrum by a 15-8 margin and committed two errors to Ferrum's one.

Quote - Head coach Brian McGee

• "This was a great day for the Tigers. I'm so happy for the guys to get the series win. The two pitchers who toed the rubber for us were injured last season, so we were very happy to see them both back on the mound doing their thing. We had seven hitters with a multi-hit day. I'm looking forward to this team playing again next week!"

Records & Milestones

• Eighth-year head coach Brian McGee is now 135-100 all-time at Wittenberg.
• O'Malley has 113 hits, 27 doubles, 11 home runs and 97 RBIs in his career. He is 53 hits, nine doubles, two home runs and 12 RBIs shy of breaking into the program's all-time top 10 in those categories.
• Thomas has 110 hits and 27 doubles in his career. He is 56 hits and nine doubles shy of breaking into the program's all-time top 10 in those categories.
• On the mound, juniors Charlie Schafer (Beavercreek, Ohio/Beavercreek) and Nate Floyd (Akron, Ohio/Copley) each have 62 career strikeouts in their pursuit of 100.

Up Next

• The Tigers return to action on Friday at Methodist at 4 p.m. for the first of three games in three days in the Methodist Invitational.