WALLA WALLA, Wash. - Whitman dropped both ends of its Northwest Conference-opening doubleheader to George Fox on Saturday at Borleske Stadium, falling 17-10 in a wild opener and 5-3 in a tight nightcap.
Game 1
The opener turned into an offensive marathon, with the teams combining for 27 runs and 28 hits as George Fox pulled away late for a 17-10 win. Whitman led 5-3 after two innings and trailed just 11-8 through five before the Bruins piled on six insurance runs over the final four frames.​
Second baseman Nate Petz headlined the Blues' attack with a four-hit, three-RBI performance that included two home runs, launching solo shots in the second and ninth innings and adding an RBI single in the fourth. Christopher Nobrega and Jonah Chang also homered, with Nobrega's solo blast in the second and Chang's two-run shot in the fifth keeping Whitman within striking distance.​
Whitman finished with 13 hits in the opener, getting multi-hit days from Petz, Halen Otte, and Nobrega, while Tristan Buehring opened the scoring with a leadoff triple in the first that set up a three-run inning. George Fox countered with a balanced lineup that produced 15 hits and 16 RBIs, using a five-run fourth inning and three-run frames in both the eighth and ninth to take control.​
Game 2
In game two, Whitman's pitching held George Fox to just seven hits, but the Bruins capitalized on free bases and miscues to edge out a 5-3 victory. The Blues led 1-0 after the third inning on Buehring's RBI single to center, scoring Nobrega. George Fox answered with an unearned run in the fourth, then used a three-run sixth inning—sparked by an Adam Fulton RBI double and two more unearned runs—to grab a 4-1 lead.​
Whitman clawed back in the sixth when Otte singled, advanced on a wild pitch, and scored on Nick Teng's sacrifice fly to center, cutting the deficit to 4-2. After the Bruins added another insurance run on a wild pitch in the eighth, the Blues mounted one final push in the ninth, loading the bases and drawing a bases-loaded walk from pinch-hitter Jonah Chang to make it 5-3 before George Fox closed out the game with the tying run at first.​
Buehring and Petz each collected two hits in the nightcap, with Buehring driving in one and Petz reaching base four times in the doubleheader to cap a strong day at the plate. Starter Oliver Brown was tagged with the loss after turning in five and one-third innings of three-hit ball with just one earned run allowed, while reliever Garen Geoghegan limited George Fox to three hits over the final 3.2 innings to keep Whitman within reach.
The Blues and Bruins close out their three-game set on Sunday with a single game starting at 12:00 p.m.
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