Storm beat Central, face Coe on Saturday

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa – Brett Crable had three hits and two RBIs, Jake Scieszinski threw eight strong innings and Simpson beat Central 9-0 in the Iowa Conference Baseball Tournament on Friday night.

Iowa Conference Tournament Central

With the win, the fifth-seeded Storm (18-22) advance to play second-seeded Coe in an elimination game on Saturday at 10 a.m. The Kohawks (27-13) lost to Wartburg 5-4 earlier in the day.

Facing Central for the second day in a row, the Simpson offense continued to prey on Dutch pitching, finishing with 13 hits on the night. In two games, Simpson scored 19 runs off 31 hits.

The Storm did all of their damage in two innings, scoring four in the second and five in the fourth.

With the bases loaded and one out in the second, Josh Pirtle lined a Robbie Rushing delivery down the right field line to score a pair. Ethan Hale scored on a groundout by Crable and Pirtle made it 4-0 on a single by Jake Barr.

Crable and Tyler Craig drove in runs on singles in the fourth before Jake Esdohr roped a bases-clearing double to make it 9-0.

While the offense provided plenty of run support, the pitching staff got a well-deserved rest thanks to the effort by Scieszinski.

Employing a "pitcher by committee" strategy in the first two games of the tournament - no hurler went more than 2 1/3 innings - head coach Ben Blake decided to stick with Scieszinski (1-1) after he entered in the second. Throwing a career-best eight innings, the sophomore allowed four hits, struck out four, walked just one and allowed only three baserunners to reach scoring position.

With the loss, the fourth-seeded Dutch (22-19) saw their season come to a close. After losing to Simpson 10-6 to start the tournament on Friday, Central beat Buena Vista 11-4 and Loras 3-0 on Saturday.

Simpson beat Central four times in six tries on the season, including a 4-0 mark in the last 11 days.