From the HCC sports desk:
LA PLATA, Md.—The Harford baseball team split doubleheaders at both Thomas Nelson and College of Southern Maryland on Saturday and Sunday. The Fighting Owls (5-3, 1-1 MDJUCO) suffered a 2-0 loss to the Gators (1-5) in game one on Saturday before blanking Thomas Nelson, 4-0, in game two and flip-flopped the results on Sunday, downing the Hawks (1-1, 1-1 MDJUCO), 13-7 in game one and falling 8-7 in game two.
Sophomore Woody Wlodarczyk (Bel Air, Md./C. Milton Wright) led Harford over the four-game weekend, going 9-for-13 (.692) with a double, five runs, four RBI and four walks, while freshman Christian Wolfe (Bel Air, Md./John Carroll) had two homers in Harford’s loss to Southern Maryland.
On the mound, sophomores Bo Loar (Fallston, Md./Fallston) and Mike Rappazzo (Bel Air, Md./C. Milton Wright) picked up the wins on the weekend, with Loar (2-0) giving up just one hit and striking out three over three scoreless innings in game two on Saturday, while Rappazzo (1-0) gave up four runs (three earned) on three hits and struck out six in four innings during Sunday’s game one.
The Owls committed three errors in the first inning of game one on Saturday, allowing two Gator runs to cross the plate, the only scores for the remainder of the game, while game two saw Harford tally one run in the third off sophomore Joe Harbach’s (Abingdon, Md./Edgewood) RBI single and add three in the seventh off an two-RBI double from Wlodarczyk and a sacrifice fly from Wolfe on the way to the 4-0 win.
The Harford bats came alive in game one on Sunday, as the Owls tallied 13 hits, but also got some help as the Hawks committed four errors, including two in the second. Harford took a 3-0 lead in the first off a two-run RBI single by sophomore Jordan Heller (Loch Raven, Md./Loch Raven/Chesapeake) and an RBI single by freshman Eric Quinn (Pylesville, Md./Harford Christian) and doubled its advantage in the second off a Hawk error and two-run RBI single by sophomore Mike Krider (State College, Pa./State College) to take a 6-0 lead.
Southern Maryland got on the board in the bottom of the third with a two-run homer by Tim Harrigan but couldn’t match Harford’s offensive output on the way to the 13-7 decision.
Game two once again saw the Owls take a 3-0 lead in the first, thanks to a three-run homer by Wolfe, his first of the game, but Southern Maryland would cut the deficit to one, 3-2, with two unearned runs off two hits, including Marc Collazo’s RBI single and two Harford errors in the second.
A lead-off homer from Harbach and a two-out dinger by Wolfe in the third and a RBI single from Wlodarczyk in the fourth would give the Owls a comfortable, 6-2 advantage as freshman Dom Vattuone (Germantown, Md./Northwest) put together an outstanding start, striking out four batters and allowing just three hits and two runs (both unearned) in four innings.
The Hawks battled back to within one run, 6-5, after scoring two in the fifth and one in the sixth, before Harford added its final run in the top of the seventh off Krider’s RBI double. Southern Maryland quickly brought its deficit down to one with an RBI double from Ryan Harris and then scored the tying and winning runs on back-to-back RBI bunt singles on the way to the 8-7 decision.
The Fighting Owls return to action on Thursday when they travel to CCBC-Catonsville for a single, nine-inning game at 3:00 p.m. before opening play at home this weekend against Salem (Sat., Mar. 13) and Massachusetts Bay (Sun., Mar. 14).
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