Rob Childress
Nick Banks
Mitchell Nau
Texas A&M Baseball
Aggie baseball rides the wind to victory over Penn State, 9-3.
GAME #5: Texas A&M 9, Penn State 3
RECORDS: Texas A&M 5-0; Penn State 0-4
WP: Minter (2-0)
LP: Hedge (0-1)
Matt Sachs, TexAgs
A.J. Minter pitched five shutout innings, striking out nine.
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Matt Sachs, TexAgs
J.B. Moss collected his second home run of the year.
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RECORDS: Texas A&M 5-0; Penn State 0-4
WP: Minter (2-0)
LP: Hedge (0-1)
BOX SCORE: Link
There’s more than one way to score a run.
With strong winds gusting around Olsen, it would have been easy for A&M to forget that.
In a 9-3 victory over Penn State on Friday night, the Aggies hit four homeruns, but stuck with a disciplined approach and it paid off.
Ryne Birk singled to get the ball rolling and was quickly moved to third with Mitchell Nau’s stand up double to right.
Nick Banks got A&M on the board two batters later with a single right back between the pitchers legs. Two men came around to score.
The Ags were off to a hot start, again.
Blake Allemand started the 2nd inning with a homerun off the scoreboard in left. A line drive to the gap rode the wind and carried A&M to a 3-0 lead.
Mitchell Nau watched his already stellar batting average climb higher in the third inning with a single into left.
Matt Sachs, TexAgs
A.J. Minter pitched five shutout innings, striking out nine.
{"Module":"photo","Alignment":"right","Size":"large","Caption":"A.J. Minter pitched five shutout innings, striking out nine.","MediaItemID":52823}
That brought a struggling Logan Nottebrok to the plate. With a full count, Logan fought one the other way into right and collected his second hit of the year.
For the second time in three innings, Nick Banks came up with two men on base. For the second time he brought both men home, this time with a double that got to the wall in left. Nick talked about the mindset the team carried into the game.
“A lot of guys looked at the wind blowing out before batting practice and got excited,” Banks said. “But it was all business once we got to batting practice. We stuck to our approach and I think a great batting practice carried over to the game.”
After battling in his last at bat, Logan Nottebrok found himself in another two strike count in the 5th inning. This time around, Logan got a hanging breaking ball and took his first home run of the year to deep left.
Breaking out of a slump is a big moment for anyone, especially somebody with the power of Nottebrok. Coach Rob Childress agreed.
“You could start to see his confidence coming back,” said Childress. “For him to have that competitive full count foul a few pitches off, single and then he hung a breaking ball next time up and Notte didn’t miss.”
Matt Sachs, TexAgs
J.B. Moss collected his second home run of the year.
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Logan Taylor and J.B. Moss hit nearly identical solo home runs to left in the 6th and 8th innings. That wrapped up the scoring for A&M, but Penn State managed to rally a few runs in between.
After another stellar five-inning performance from A.J. Minter, in which he struck out nine, Kyle Simonds took the mound and Cody Whiting after him.
It wasn’t until Whiting took the mound in the 8th inning that Penn State got a runner to cross home. A high home run and deep sac fly allowed the Nittany Lions to avoid a shutout, but it was not something coach Childress would give much thought to moving forward.
“Shutouts are hard to come by and when you get a chance to get one, you want to get it, “ he said. “They got a big hit and scored three runs, but I’ll take the win over a shut out any day of the week.”
A&M will have a chance to add another win and clinch the series over Penn State tomorrow at 2:05.
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