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Saturday afternoon I got home from running a few errands and there were 7 inches of snow in my back yard. It was March 24th. Getting that much snow this late in the season is not unheard of, but it is not exactly common. By this afternoon bright sunshine and low 40s had melted much of it.
So of course, this messed with the opening home weekend of Purdue baseball.
Purdue hosted Lipscomb this weekend in what was supposed to be a 3-game set. The schools agreed to play a doubleheader on Friday to get at least two games in while they had a weather window, and game three was scheduled for Saturday with Sunday as a fallback. The weather came and game 3 was cancelled, as Alexander Field was not ready Sunday afternoon, either. The teams did get both games in on Friday and each walked away with a victory.
Lipscomb 3, Purdue 1
In the opener on Friday Tanner Andrews had a terrible first inning and it ended up costing him. He went single, fielder’s choice, walk, single, RBI walk, RBI hit-by-pitch as the Bisons led 2-0 before Purdue even batted. That ended up being enough for a Purdue offense that put runners on base, but could not get them home.
Evan Kennedy had a one out single and scored on a wild pitch in the second for Purdue, but that was all the offense the Boilers could muster. Purdue left 10 men on base and wasted another decent outing by Andrews. He is now 2-3 on the year, but he only gave up a pair of earned runs in 5 innings. Bo Hofstra kept Purdue in it with four innings of one-hit ball, but Purdue left a runner on base in each of the last 5 innings.
Purdue 6, Lipscomb 2
Finally, the Boilers got off the schneid after losing 9 of 10 coming in. Gareth Stroh moved to 3-0 on the year with 5 solid innings and only two runs given up despite 6 walks. He was in and out of trouble, but only a pair of runners touched the plate. Trevor Cheaney, Dalton Parker, Cameron Williams, and Ross Learnard all pitched a scoreless inning to close it.
Purdue jumped on Lipscomb starter Chris Kachmar early. They tagged him for five runs in the first two innings to establish an early lead. Evan Kennedy provided a 2-run double in the first and Nick Dalesandro had a 2-run single in the second. That was enough to give the Boilers a 5-0 lead.
Lipscomb got a pair of runs in the sixth to cut it to 5-2, but Jacson McGowan got one of those runs back in the seventh and the bullpen closed it out.
Purdue comes out of the weekend at 10-10 in advance of starting Big Ten play at Penn State next weekend. The Nittany Lions went 1-2 this weekend at Rutgers, losing the first two games 4-1 and 1-0, but they won game 3 9-3. First they will have a midweek game at home against Valparaiso Wednesday night.