Bulldogs sweep Hawks in finale, ready to go to Gastonia

With 15 seniors getting their moment of appreciation prior to Saturday’s regular-season ending doubleheader against Chowan, the Barton College baseball team was more than ready to end its losing streak and set a program record.

The Bulldogs did just that in game 1 with an 11-0 victory in seven innings that broke the program’s NCAA-era record for wins in a season. Senior starting pitcher Matt Rivers and senior Jacob Shapley combined for the team’s third shutout of the season and Barton pounded six extra-base hits.

With senior ace Tanner Halvorson taking the Nixon Field mound for a final time, Barton then turned around a 5-0 deficit into a 9-6 comeback victory in game 2 that left it with a 34-14 overall mark and a new program record.

“I was proud to see our guys come out with great energy in game 1 and really kind of dominate that game from start to finish,” Barton head coach Keith Gorman said. “Obviously, Rivers gave us a great outing, as he’s been doing. and then in game 2, I thought they did a good job against Tanner and we needed to make a couple of tough catches that didn’t happen and all of a sudden we’re down 5-0. But the positive is, I think we kept our discipline and our approach and chipped away at it and then were able to strike and got into their bullpen pretty deep. It was just good to see us end the regular season on a high note like that after some really tough one-run losses the week prior.”

Indeed, the Bulldogs, who finished Conference Carolinas play 17-13 and in sixth place, had a tough run since arguably their high point of the season a couple of weeks ago. Barton rallied to beat then nationally No. 10-ranked Mount Olive 13-12 on Sunday, April 14, to complete the three-game sweep at Nixon Field.

But the momentum fizzled promptly the following weekend when Barton was swept by Erskine, including a pair of one-run outcomes, before an 8-5 nonconference loss Tuesday at Lenoir-Rhyne. Chowan won Friday’s series opener 3-2 before Barton, which hadn’t lost more than two in a row, end its skid at five games.

The Bulldogs came out swinging Saturday in the noon opener, scoring four runs on three hits — doubles by Evan Harding, Halvorson and Josh Hoffman — off Chowan starter Nicky Wohleking (0-8) in the first inning. Harding belted a two-run home run in the second and Halvorson followed with a two-run shot in the fourth.

The eight-run lead was more than enough for Rivers, a right-handed transfer from Gardner-Webb, as he got his fifth win against two losses with six solid innings. He gave up six hits but walked none and struck out six.

Shapley walked one and struck out one in his one-inning Senior Day stint.

Harding was 4 for 4 with three RBIs while Halvorson was 2 for 2 and drove in three runs. Mason Staz was 1 for 3 with two RBIs.

Before the game, 15 seniors were honored before their final game at Nixon Field. The group of seniors were T.J. Newby, Raymond Panaigua, James Holladay, Davis Powell, Nate Robison, Clay Campbell, Brett Anderson, Landon Sykes, John McNamee, William Leonard, Luke Pritchett, Connor Patterson, Shapley, Hoffman and Halvorson, who didn’t know he would get a senior season until the end of December.

Halvorson, who earned first-team All-America status as a pitcher last season, has not had quite the same success this spring with a 4.68 ERA, up from 1.71 last season. However, Halvorson does have more strikeouts (88) in fewer innings (77) than he did last season when he fanned 79 in 95 innings on his way to Conference Carolinas Pitcher of the Year.

Saturday’s game 2 was an example as the Hawks, next to last in team batting average and the lowest-scoring team in Conference Carolinas, rapped nine hits and scored five earned runs off the Barton ace. Still, Gorman wasn’t concerned, given that Halvorson didn’t have any fall innings and is still finding his pitches.

“Our conference is really good and they are overly prepared for Tanner,” Gorman said. “I mean, they are focused on him and rightfully so. And he’s had a little bit of a bad luck. I mean, I thought he pitched really well at Erskine. I thought he’s pitched really well in a couple other places and hasn’t gotten the wins. So he’s our guy, he’s going to get the ball game 1 at the conference tournament. I think he’s in a really good spot, starting to see some different things with a couple of his pitches.”

Barton’s comeback started with right fielder Matthew Rivera’s team-leading eighth homer, a solo shot to left field, in the fifth. Rivera and Hoffman then slapped RBI singles in the sixth before Halvorson singled in a run in the seventh, setting up catcher Chase Waddell’s two-run single up the middle to give Barton the lead.

Hoffman then tripled in Halvorson and Waddell before trotting home on Luis Sauri’s two-out double to complete the carnage.

The Bulldogs scored six runs on six hits, setting up Halvorson’s successor, A.J. Campbell, for the win after working 2 1/3 innings. Brett Anderson, one of the aforementioned seniors, notched his second save of 2024 by getting the last two outs.

Konnor Tomczak took the loss for the Hawks (8-36, 4-26), who finished dead last in Conference Carolinas and do not qualify for the tournament. The Bulldogs will get the No. 6 seed and take on No. 3 Mount Olive (34-14, 20-9) on Thursday at 7 p.m. at CaroMount Health Park in Gastonia.

Gorman said the experience of going head-to-head with some of the country’s top teams, all in Conference Carolinas, has his squad ready to hit the field in Gastonia. But double-elimination tournament success starts and ends with pitching, he said.

“Our starting pitching is going to have to be really good, which for the most part, it has been as a whole,” Gorman said. “Our pitchers and our staff as a whole have been one of the top in the country. That is so important in a double-elimination tournament and I think one of the reasons why we’ve had some success. Our guys are going to be prepared for the opposing offenses and if we pitch it well, I think we’ve got a good chance to continue to advance in that tournament. But our best players — offensively defensively — they have to be our best players. Those guys have to lead us, those guys that have been there in the tournament, and then some of our role players, our more inexperienced players, they’ve got to do the little things. So I feel really good about it. We have been competitive all year in the toughest conference in the country. There’s not a lot that separates these teams in the conference and getting hot and having good starting pitching will probably be the difference.”

One thing Barton brings to the tournament table this spring is more depth in the bullpen, so much so that Gorman has not had a chance to get the number of innings he’d hoped for some of those arms. But he has advised them: Stay ready.

“We have really good guys in the bullpen that have not gotten a lot of innings lately,” he said. “You know, so those guys are fresh. I feel good about them. I think in my career, this is probably one of the deepest pitching staffs I’ve had. And I’ve had some really good pitching staffs in the past. So, I told the guys this the other day, if we do what we want to do in this tournament, there’s going to be some guys in meaningful spots that aren’t leading us in innings at the end.”

GAME 1

Score by innings:

Chowan 000 000 0 — 0

Barton 420 230 x — 11

W-Matt Rivers (5-2) 6 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 6 SO. L-Nicky Wohleking (0-8) 1 IP, 3 H, 4 R, 3 ER, 1 BB, 1 SO.

LEADING HITTERS — Chowan: Ryan Bellamy 2-3. Barton: Tanner Halvorson 2-2, 2B, HR, 3 RBIs; Evan Harding 4-4, 2B, HR, 3 R, 3 RBIs; Josh Hoffman 1-2, 2B, RBI; Salvatore Laimo 1-3, 2B, 2 R; Mason Staz 1-3, 2 RBIs.

GAME 2

Score by innings:

Chowan 002 300 001 — 6

Barton 000 012 60x — 9

W-A.J. Campbell (4-2) 2 1/3 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 1 SO. L-Konnor Tomczak (0-1) 1/3 IP, 4 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 1 BB, 0 SO.

LEADING HITTERS — Chowan: Patrick Krack 3-5, 2B, 2 R, 2 RBIs; Geomar Santanta 2-2, RBI; Ethan Robinson 3-5, RBI; Ryan Bellamy 2-5, RBI; Dawerlyn Amancio 1-2, 2B, R. Barton: Chase Waddell 3-3, 2 R, 2 RBIs; Josh Hoffman 2-4, 3B, 3 RBIs; Tanner Halvorson 2-5, 2 R, RBI; Evan Harding 2-4, 2B, R; Salvatore Laimo 2-4, R; Matthew Rivera 2-4, HR, 2 RBIs; Luis Sauri 1-2, 2B, RBI.

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