Panthers Baseball Lose in Blowout Fashion to Union College

By Shaya Silberstein

The Purchase Panthers baseball team played their second game of the season on March 1. They lost 11-3 as part of their doubleheader versing Union College where they started a 0-2 record on the season.

On a windy Saturday, the team would allow a lot of soft contact hits, which led to them allowing seven runs in the sixth inning.  

“Well, that could happen fast on this level,” said Coach Adam Taraska. “Against good teams, they make you pay for your mistakes, and if you make errors, and walk guys, and put guys on base, the good teams would follow you up with guys that can bang the ball into the gap and drive the guy home. That’s what happened in that inning there.”

 Panos Sinis batting for the Panthers. (Photo by Nolan Locke) 

Starting the second game would be sophomore Christian Miesegaes. He pitched five solid innings of six runs and 10 hits. He spoke of his performance, “First day out, that's a really good team. I thought I pitched pretty well; just didn't go our way.”

While he allowed six runs, Taraska was confident in Miesegaes's pitching. “I thought he pitched a very good game, I thought he pitched to contact and allowed the ball to be put in play," said Taraska. "Sometimes when they figure you out, balls in play can hurt you, but Christian is not a pitcher that's gonna throw the ball by you, its going to be a lot of balls in play and we know that. I thought he did a very good job of making them swing. He had one inning where he allowed a couple of line-drives, but other than that, I don't think they hit him very hard at all.”  

Christian Miesegaes winding up for a pitch versus Union College. (Photo by Nolan Locke)

The offense started off struggling as they were leaving multiple men on base. They missed out on an opportunity in the third inning, where they left two men on base after having first and third with one out. They were able to score their first run on a wild pitch in the fourth inning, but that was the only run in that inning. Then, in the sixth inning scored two runs on back-to-back extra base hits.

Senior Matthew Deall, who hit the first runs batted in double in the 6th inning, spoke on what he saw in that at bat. He said, “Saw a couple of fastballs in the a-bat, sitting away the whole time, ran one on the inside and got a good hold of it.”