CHICAGO, IL�€"Taylor McIntyre (Edmond,
Okla.) tossed a no-hitter in game one and Dennis Bigley (Lancaster,
Texas) earned his 40th career victory with his fifth
shutout of the season in game two as Oral Roberts University swept
a Mid-Continent Conference doubleheader from Chicago State, winning
the opener 6-0 and the nightcap 3-0, Friday at Les Miller
Field.
McIntyre (6-6) faced
just two batters over the minimum in recording the sixth no-hitter
�€" and the first 9-inning no-no by a single pitcher
�€" in ORU history. He struck out 10 batters,
including Chris Goya to end the game.
The junior left-hander
allowed a two-out walk in the first and set down the next 14
batters before plunking Joe Perez with one out in the sixth.
McIntyre finished the game by retiring the final 11 batters.
Only once did the
Cougars (6-48, 2-20 Mid-Con) come close to getting a base hit. ORU
second baseman Brian
Hanson (Kelseyville, Calif.) robbed Hector Navedo with a
leaping grab in the eighth. Otherwise, Chicago State hit only five
balls out of the infield.
ORU (35-18, 20-2)
scored all the runs it needed in the first inning. Shortstop
Michael
Hollimon (Dallas, Texas) led off with a walk, stole second
and advanced to third on a throwing error, and scored on Hanson's
sacrifice fly for a 1-0 lead,
An RBI single by Bigley
in the second inning gave ORU a 2-0 lead, and a sacrifice fly by
Rene Recio
(Corpus Christi, Texas) and an RBI triple by Ricky Rivera (Santa Isabel,
P.R.) made it 4-0 in the third.
Recio drilled an RBI
triple in the fifth and ORU scored an unearned run in the seventh
for the final margin.
Jonathan Duncan (1-6)
took the loss for the Cougars.
In game two, Bigley
(10-3) became just the 25th player in NCAA history to
reach 40 career wins, and he also completed a scoreless romp
through the Mid-Con.
In six Mid-Con starts
Bigley didn't allow a run, covering 41.1 innings. Overall, Bigley
hasn't allowed an earned run in his last 49.1 innings and currently
has pitched 28.1 innings without allowing a run of any kind.
The Golden Eagles gave
Bigley a 2-0 cushion in the top of the first on a two-run single by
Recio.
An run-scoring infield
single by Kevin
Lamb (Owasso, Okla.) in the second inning made it 3-0 and
capped the scoring for ORU.
Bigley twice faced
adversity, including in the opening inning. Jonathan Sakurai and
Chris Goya led off with singles. Buy Giya was caught stealing on
the back end of a double steal attempt and Bigley induced fly ball
outs from the next two batters to end the threat.
After retiring 11
straight batters following Goya's single in the first, Bigley gave
up a walk and a hit two the first two batters in the fifth. With
runners on the corners and none out, Bigley got a pop up, a
strikeout and a caught stealing to get out of the jam.
Bigley gave up three
hits and walked one while striking out seven batters. The shutout
lowered Bigley's season ERA to 1.52.
Chris Freshour (1-11)
took the loss for Chicago State.
Hanson led the Golden
Eagles with four hits in two games, while Recio led the way with
four RBI.
The Golden Eagles and
Cougars wrap up the 2005 regular season with a 5 p.m., Saturday
doubleheader.
--ORU--
