Advertisement

Harvard Baseball Sweeps Doubleheader With Yale

The Harvard baseball team, aided by numerous Yale errors, twice rallied in the final innings to sweep a doubleheader from the Bulldogs, 2-1, 5-4.

The Crimson has moved into a tie for first place in the Eastern League as Cornell. Dartmouth, and Princeton all lost a game over the weekend.

Harvard needs a victory over Brown today, however, to keep pace with four once-beaten teams. Friday's snowed- out game with the Bruins has been rescheduled for 3 p. m. this afternoon.

Both Yale games followed identical patterns. Yale, looking like the better team, built an early lead on Harvard errors but blew the seven-inning games on their own errors in the sixth.

Ahead 1-0 in the first game. Eli centerfielder Chuck Sizemore raced under and dropped a deep two-run triple to centerfield. In the second game, pitcher Rodger Finney came in to protect a 4-1 lead and promptly delivered 14 pitches- three walks, a double, and a ???crifice fly- for four Harvard runs.

Advertisement

In the first game. Yale sta??ter Jay Bryan struck out five of the first nine batters he faced and held the Crimson to three scratch singles. But the Bull-dogs only got two hits and a single unearned run off Crimson starter Phil Collins.

Yale scored in the third when second baseman Joe Massey singled to left, advanced on an error by third baseman Mike Thomas, and came home on a wild pitch.

Harvard's hitting attack looked dead by the sixth, but with two out and a runner on first, Yale third-baseman Bernie Sowley dropped a looping fly to left and put the winning run on base. Vince McGugan then hit his long triple to center. Sizemore seemed surprised that he had reached the ball and he watched it dribble off his glove.

J. C. Nickens came in to strike out the heart of the Yale batting order in the seventh inning of both the first and second game to preserve the wins.

Yale scored the only earned runs of the day in the second inning of the second game. After the Bulldogs opened the inning with a single and double, pitcher Joe Corcoran and Bob Unger laid down two perfect suicide bunts with the runners stealing.

The Bulldogs stretched their lead in the third and fourth with two unearned runs before relief pitcher Sandy Weissent came in. He and Nickens held the Eli to a single hit in the final four in.

Harvard leaded the bases in the first and fifth but only scored a single run in the third when McGugan doubled and scored two outs later on a pass ball.

The Crimson sixth must have aged Yale coach Ken MacKenzie. Sitting on a comfortable 4-1 lead, he watched Corcoran load the bases on a single and two walks. In came fastball relief pitcher Finney. What Finney had in speed he lacked in control. Fourteen pitches, no strikes, and four runs later, Finney took a shower.

Eastern League

W L

Advertisement