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POST-GAME PRESS CONFERENCE

WESTERVILLE, Ohio – The top-seeded Otterbein baseball team overcame a morning setback with a hard-fought victory later Friday afternoon, hanging on to eliminate Marietta College, 5-3, on day two of the Ohio Athletic Conference Tournament at Fishbaugh Field.

The Cardinals, reaching 30 wins for the third-straight season, advance to Saturday's OAC Championship contest for a rematch with No. 3 seed Baldwin Wallace, which dealt Otterbein a wild 22-8 loss in the initial winner's game of the day. Otterbein will need to defeat BW twice in order to claim the title.

Marietta, the tournament's second seed and also ranked 25th nationally, now stands 27-16 on the year and will wait to see if they receive an NCAA at-large bid.

The Cards fell victim to a red-hot Baldwin Wallace club in the morning, where the Yellow Jackets tallied 21 hits and pulled away in the later innings. Otterbein trailed 5-1 before tying the game in the third on 2-RBI doubles from Connor Brett and Justin Feltner.

That scored remained the same until the fifth, when BW manufactured a two-out rally and ultimately plated four runs to never trail again. The Yellow Jackets then added six more in the sixth and have now scored 41 runs in the past two outings.

Brett went 3 for 5 with three doubles in the game for Otterbein, which also had two-hit performances from Bryan Stopar and Luke Barber.

The Cards regrouped in the early afternoon before taking on the Pioneers, who emerged in a tight 2-0 elimination game over Ohio Northern behind a complete-game shutout from Scott Oberhelman. He needed just 77 pitches to go the distance.

Marietta took an early 1-0 lead against freshman Ethan Doty on the mound, but the Cardinals settled in quickly with a pair of two-run homers to grab a 4-1 advantage. Barber lofted his round tripper down the right-field line and saw it ding the foul pole, and then Tim Snyder followed in the second inning with another shot that cleared the right-field fence.

Doty did a nice job on the hill from that point, keeping the Pioneer offensive relatively quiet until the fifth inning when they clawed to within 4-3 on an RBI-groundout followed by scoring on a wild pitch.

Otterbein had a prime opportunity to get runs back in the bottom of the fifth, loading the bases with no outs, before a strikeout and ground-ball double play left the frame empty. The Cards went to reliver Jaryd Murphy when Doty's pitch count rose and he found some trouble in the sixth, and the junior-right-hander escaped a runners on the corners situation by inducing an inning-ending double play to return the favor.

Murphy kept the score what it was to the middle of the eighth inning, benefited by another diving grab from Snyder in the outfield during the top half, and Otterbein added a critical insurance run in the bottom half to give closer Collin Hoffmann a little extra breathing room for the ninth. Marietta didn't go quietly, eventually loading the bases with two outs before a long flyout from clean-up hitter Mike Hale was tracked down by Snyder in deep left-center.

Stopar hit 3 for 4 to help the Cards advance while Barber and Mitch Stotler both contributed two hits. Doty moved to a 5-1 record this season on the hill and Hoffman notched his fifth save.

The start time for Saturday's championship game has been moved up to 10 a.m. in hopes of avoiding any potential weather issues. Should Otterbein win the first contest, a second "if necessary" game will take place shortly thereafter to crown a winner.