After allowing UND starter Derek Biermaier to throw 8 2/3 innings, Sioux coach Jeff Dodson admitted it was a difficult trip to the mound with one out left of a potential complete-game victory.
"I thought I might have to pry the ball out of his hand," Dodson said.
Biermaier was just as tough to hit as we was to take out of the game. The Sioux turned to reliever Brandon Baumgartner to get the last out, but Biermaier's body of work is what gave the Sioux a 5-3 win over Houston Baptist in the second game of a Great West Conference doubleheader on Saturday at Kraft Field.
Houston Baptist defeated UND 9-5 in eight innings in the first game.
"Derek is a tough kid between the ears," Dodson said. "The guys play hard behind him simply for his work ethic on the mound. He had a brilliant performance today. He threw tremendous."
ADVERTISEMENT
Biermaier, a Roseau, Minn., native, kept HBU hitters off balance with a nice mix of off-speed pitches. He struck out five, while allowing six hits and three earned runs.
The junior righthander ran into trouble in the ninth when he walked Derek Smith and beaned Paul Prestera with two outs. Next up was left-handed hitting Zeke Zikeli, who had a three-run double in his previous at-bat against Biermaier. So the Sioux turned to Baumgartner, a lefty who picked up his fifth save of the year by getting Zikeli to pop out to shortstop.
"It was tough when I went out there (to take out Biermaier)," Dodson said. "But I told him why we were doing this, and he understood what was best for the club."
The Sioux had just enough run support for Biermaier.
UND put three across in the sixth inning with a big two-out rally, highlighted by a Ridge Halenar double.
The Sioux scored a pair of go-ahead runs in the bottom of the seventh when shortstop Josh Nelson singled in Andrew Gudmunson and Jake Magner.
"We were hitting it hard right at people for a while," Nelson said. "It's important to play out a whole series and keep doing what we do. We just had to keep swinging away."
It was a big win for the Sioux, who dropped the first two games of the series while being plagued by leaving runners on base.
ADVERTISEMENT
In the first game of Saturday's doubleheader, the Sioux fell behind 5-0 before scoring four runs in the bottom of the sixth inning, eventually sending the game to extra innings.
But Baumgartner, who quickly recorded two outs in the eighth, walked the next three hitters to load the bases.
Johnathon Moore followed with a single to score two runs as HBU scored four times in the inning.
However, Dodson was more upset with UND's third inning, which saw HBU score four unearned runs on starter Sam Anderson.
"That's a tough one to stomach," Dodson said.
With the split Saturday, UND (15-29 overall) will hope for a series split when it hosts Houston Baptist (25-26) in the final game of the four-game set today at 1 p.m.
