Buffalo Bulls Baseball sweeps the Akron Zips

Buffalo came into this weekends series against Akron on a four game skid. If UB was unable to change their fortunes the MAC East would be out of reach. Fortunately the Bulls were able to down second place Akron three games to none.

Elsewhere in the MAC Bowling Green beat Kent in their series by a two games to one mark. The Bulls went from falling out of the race to a half game behind the Flashes in the Mid American Conference East Division. Akron fell from second to fourth.

Game 1:

Kevin Huges completed his second straight complete game win. Behing his solid nine innings the Bulls held off Akron in the opening game of the series on Friday afternoon.

Buffalo got on the board first when Jimmy Topps singled off the third base bag to start the third inning. A wild pitch sent tops to second and then with one out Tyler Mautner brought him home with a single through the left side of the infield.

In a tied fifth inning UB went ahead for good thanks to an Akron error. Matt Pollock hit a two-out grounder to short that got kicked around for an error, then he stole second base. Mautner hit another single through the hole at shortstop to put the Bulls back up.

Still up 2-1 heading to the bottom of the eighth, the Bulls scored the game winning run when Brian Dudek hit a single back up the middle and then took second on a wild pitch. After walks to Mike Scarcello and Topps loaded the bases, Nick Sinay took a 2-2 offering off his left shoulder to get an RBI the hard way.

Akron was able to score one more off Hughes in the 9th but the Bull Pitcher buckled down for the win. The senior hurler would finish with five strikeouts, six hits allowed and one earned run given up while throwing just 109 pitches. Offensively, Pollock, Dudek and Mike Burke would join Mautner with multi-hit games.

Game 2:

UB secured the series win on Satuday when Anthony Magovney earned his team-best sixth win of the season and Cory Folk closed it out with two shutout innings for his third save.

Akron opened up the game with spotty pitching. Jimmy Topps, Nick Sinay and Tyler Mautner would all walk during the first inning and Richards would strike with a single through the right side which scored two runs. Things stayed the same until the third inning when the Akron lineup plated three runs to take their first lead of the weekend.

UB played small ball through the 4th and 5th innings to eventually hand Magovney the lead back in the fifth. The UB offense was unable to score in the sixth and seventh, but added important insurance runs from Richards in the eighth to seal the win. Topps led off with a single, and Sinay beat out a sacrifice attempt for an infield single. A sacrifice from Pollock moved both into scoring position, and Richards would smoke a 1-2 pitch back up the middle to plate them both and give Folk a 6-3 lead heading to the ninth.

Folk would nail down the save by allowing just a single hit in the eighth inning and striking out a pair. His third save of the season is a team high and puts him in the top 10 in program history for a single season.

Game 3:

In game three things started right for Buffalo but Akron took control in the middle innings as they sought to break up the UB weekend sweep. Unfortunatly for the Zips Buffalo battled back with six unanswered runs in the final two innings to win 11-6. UB Freshman Kaelin got the win after throwing 4.1 scoreless innings. At the plate and Mallaro went go 4-4 with three RBI.

Already up 2-0 in the the third, Mautner led off with a double and would then score on a one-out single from Mallaro. After a single by Brian Dudek put runners on the corners, Mike Scarcello hit a double down the left field line to make it a 5-0 lead. Midway through the game the sweep seemed like a sure thing.

Akron had different ideas. The Zips scored three in the fourth and then put up three more on UB Senior Mike Burke. Down 6-5 Buffalo made a change sending Kaelin in to get the 5ths final out.

The UB freshman found himself in a jam during the seventh but two Akron two-out singles in the seventh were not enough to increase their one run lead.

Buffalo took the lead for good during the seventh when Mallaro led off with a single, and the Akron pitcher would mishandle a sacrifice bunt attempt from Kyle Figgins. Buffalo now had runners on first and second with no outs. Dudek would move both runners over with a successful sacrifice, and Scarcello drove in Mallaro with a deep fly ball to center field that tied the score at 6-6. Jimmy Topps would get the eventual game-winning hit, slapping a two-out single to left center to put the Bulls ahead for good.

Buffalo opened the eighth with three batters using a single, walk and error to load the basses. Mallaro came up big yet again, dropping a single to right that scored a run. Kyle Brennan, who replaced Figgins at catcher in the top of the eighth, would hit a single back up the middle immediately after that scored two more. The final run came in on a two-out wild pitch for the final 11-6 margin.

The Bulls have five games this week, up first will be a doubleheader at Niagara on Tuesday, starting at 2 pm. Then next weekend, it travels to MAC East rival Miami for three.