Penguins Get Hot At Right Time to Win Title

    For five days during the Horizon League Baseball Tournament, one team showed that no matter how tough a regular season can be, anything is possible in the postseason.
    Youngstown State finished last in the regular season in the Horizon League standings, but with nothing to lose, and playing on their home turf, the Penguins put together one of the most memorable comebacks in conference history. Despite a seventh-place regular-season league finish, YSU earned the Horizon League's automatic bid to the NCAA Regionals with a perfect run through the tournament, capped by a 10-1 victory over Cleveland State in the championship game.
    The Penguins began the tournament as a long shot, considering no team below a four seed had ever won the title and a host school had not won the event since 1994. But in its opening game, YSU put together a comeback that will be remembered by the school for years.
    Trailing 3-0 to second-seeded Butler in ninth inning, the Penguins somehow found a way to win. Youngstown State scrapped out a run with one out and then scored three with two outs to earn the come-from-behind win. After that game, the race to the title was one.
    The YSU-Butler game was the final tilt on the first day after UW-Milwaukee beat Wright State 11-3 and Cleveland State opened with an 11-6 victory over Detroit.
    The second day featured the first appearance by regular-season champion UIC. The Flames' tournament debut went well earning a 9-6 victory over UW-Milwaukee. In the first elimination game of the event, Detroit knocked out Wright State by a 7-3 margin. The contest was the final for 30-year Raider Coach Rob Nischwitz who announced during the year that this was his final campaign in the dugout for WSU.
    The nightcap was another wild affair as Butler overcame a 7-1 deficit, thanks to a nine-run third inning, to pull out a 15-12 win over UW-Milwaukee in the highest scoring and second elimination game of the day.
    The morning affair on the third day featured Cleveland State and Youngstown State with the winner advancing to play UIC on Saturday for a berth in the title game. The Penguins struck for six runs in the second and behind pitcher Eric Shaffer cruised to a 7-2 win over the Vikings.
    In the afternoon game between Detroit and Butler, both teams battled back-and-forth for most of the contest. With the game tied 3-3 in the bottom of the 10th, the Bulldogs' Matt Martino hit a walk-off home run to advance the Bulldogs to a game against Cleveland State.
    However, Cleveland State's Steve Chinn hit an RBI double with two out in the top of the ninth to beat Butler 2-1 on the final game of day three.
    On Saturday, the host Penguins beat UIC for the fourth time this season pulling out a 5-4 victory in the winner's bracket game. YSU scored three first-inning runs before UIC rallied to tie the contest 4-4 in the eighth. But the Penguins scored a run in the top of the ninth on an Adam Cox sacrifice fly and advanced to the title game.
    Cleveland State made sure it was an all Northeast Ohio final excusing UIC from the tournament by a 9-8 margin. The Vikings benefited from a seven-run fifth inning and a three-run ninth to earn a 12-8 victory.
    In Sunday's title game, the Penguins were not to be denied on their home field. YSU jumped out to a 9-0 lead on the Vikings and eventually won 10-1 earning the school's first Conference Championship in the school's 50-year baseball history.