• The Panthers fell to Winthrop, 12-5, in the first game of Saturday’s doubleheader at Winthrop Ballpark.
• Senior Josh Greene reached base four times for High Point, going 2-3 with two walks and a run scored.
• Senior Blake Schunk had a career-high three hits, including a double, and recorded an RBI and a run scored.
ROCK HILL, S.C. – The High Point University baseball team dropped the first game of Saturday’s doubleheader against Winthrop by a score of 12-5 in Rock Hill, S.C. Senior Josh Greene reached base four times, going 2-3 with two walks.
Freshman Drew Daczkowski dropped to 2-2 on the season after allowing nine runs, five earned on seven hits and a two walks in 4-1/3 innings of work.
Nate Pawelczyk allowed three earned runs in 5-2/3 innings to pick up his third win, improving to 3-1 on the season. The right-hander allowed nine hits and two walks while striking out just two.
High Point drops to 10-11 overall and 1-4 in the Big South with the loss while Winthrop improves to 12-11 overall and 4-1 in conference play.
High Point put runners on base in each of the first four innings but was unable to get on the board, stranding seven. In the fourth, the Panthers loaded the bases with no outs but a comebacker to the mound led to a double play and a fly ball to the warning track kept the game scoreless.
In the bottom of the fourth, Winthrop managed to take advantage of two High Point errors to break the scoreless stalemate with four unearned runs. The Eagles then added five runs in the following inning to go ahead 9-0 after five frames.
High Point scored three times in the sixth to cut into the Eagle lead. Freshman Cody Oerther hit a pinch-hit double to drive in junior Carson Jackson for the first run. The Panthers then loaded the bases before scoring two runs on a single by junior Jordan Sergent and an RBI groundout by junior Austen Zente.
After Winthrop went back ahead by nine with two runs in the sixth and one in the eighth, High Point tacked on two runs in the ninth to make the final score 12-5. Redshirt-junior Zach Vandergrift and junior Blake Schunk delivered back-to-back two-out RBI doubles for the Panthers.
Schunk joined Greene with multiple hits in the contest, finishing 3-4 with a double, an RBI and a run scored.
High Point and Winthrop wrap up their three-game series with the second game of Saturday’s doubleheader starting at 4:30 p.m., at Winthrop Ballpark.