Box Score
Lancaster, Pa. - Joe Wendle hit a home run, went 3-for-5 with three runs and had six RBI to lead West Chester to a 16-2 win over Mercyhurst in the championship game of the PSAC Tournament on Thursday evening. With the win, West Chester wins its first PSAC tournament championship since the 1985 season and its sixth overall, tying it with Kutztown for the third-most in PSAC history behind Shippensburg and Mansfield.
Nick Spisak went 3-for-4 with three runs and an RBI and came just a triple shy of the cycle for West Chester. Blair Dameron went 2-for-4 with a pair of runs while Bob Stumpo also went 2-for-4 with a pair of runs. Tournament MVP Matt Cotellese drove in two runs and had a double as part of West Chester's 15-hit attack.
Connor Kerins picked up the win for the Golden Rams by throwing five innings and allowing just three hits and one run while striking out four. Three relievers combined to shut the door on Mercyhurst as Carmen Daddario, Bret Moyer and Jordan Lehman combined to throw four innings and allow just three hits and one run.
The game was close for much of it until West Chester ran away in the middle innings and then put up seven runs in the eighth inning to blow it open. Mercyhurst took the lead in the first inning as Trey Bennett was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded. It remained that way until the fourth as Mercyhurst starter Adam Gray induced two double plays in the first three innings to help keep the Rams off the board. In the fourth, however, Wendle delievered the first of his three RBI hits of the game with a two-run double and two more runs scored on a failed pickoff throw to third with runners on second and third.
Spisak drilled a leadoff home run to left in the fifth to put West Chester up 5-1 and then Wendle delivered the big blow of the game in the sixth, as he hit his first career home run, a three-run shot to right, as part of another four-run inning to put the Golden Rams up 9-1. Mercyhurst got an RBI single from Jeff Stoll in the seventh to cut it to 9-2 but West Chester then grabbed seven more runs in the bottom of the eighth off three different Mercyhurst pitchers. They were aided by four walks in the inning and Cotellese had a two-run double in the frame.
The Golden Rams clinch the automatic berth to the upcoming NCAA Tournament with the win.