CARY, N.C. — Tulane scored two runs in the bottom of the fourth and three more in the fifth to beat the rain and defeat Dartmouth (1-4) in both teams’ first game of the Army Invitational at the USA Baseball National Training Complex on Friday afternoon. The game was halted with two outs in the bottom half of the fifth as the rain increased in intensity and made it impossible to safely continue.
Box Score
Kaleb Roper (1-1) picked up his first win of the year for the Green Wave (8-2), allowing just two hits and the one run over five frames while striking out six without a walk.
Senior Cole O’Connor (1-1) was dealt his first defeat of the season for yielding five runs, all earned, on six hits in 4.2 innings. The right-hander struck out five and, like his counterpart, did not walk a batter.
Both pitchers cruised through the first three innings with the lone base runner for either side being a two-out single by Big Green senior Matt Feinstein in the second. Dartmouth finally broke through in the fourth when junior Trevor Johnson stroked a leadoff double, took third on a tapper back to the mound and trotted home on junior Michael Calamari’s deep fly to right for a 1-0 lead.
In the bottom half, Kody Hoese quickly turned the tables by smashing a two-run homer after Trevor Jensen led off with a base hit, giving Tulane the 2-1 advantage.
Roper made quick work of the Big Green bats in the fifth, striking out the side to make it an official game, and the Green Wave waved home three more runs in the bottom half — two on RBI singles by Jensen and Grant Mathews — before the umpires had the teams get the tarp on the field.
Jensen and Mathews each had two hits and an RBI for Tulane. Hoese had two RBIs thanks to his team-leading fifth home run of the year.
Dartmouth will return to NTC Stadium Saturday for a doubleheader against Fairleigh Dickinson, which will also finish its suspended game against Army prior to the twinbill at 1 p.m. The first game will be a seven-inning contest followed by a nine-inning game.
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Notes: The contest against Tulane was originally scheduled to start at 4:30 p.m. but was moved up to 2 p.m. in an effort to get the game in. … Dartmouth did not have much rest prior to the game after catching a 6:30 a.m. flight from Boston.
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