Jasmine Li | Student Life

The WashU baseball team finished up the regular season this past week, April 22-27, with a home victory against No. 16 Webster University followed by a four-game-series split on the road against University Athletic Association (UAA) rival Emory U

niversity. This concluded the Bears’ regular season with an overall record of 25-15 and a 10-10 record in the UAA, earning them fourth place in the conference. The Bears will now wait until May 11 to learn if they will receive an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.

Game One – WashU: 9, Webster: 2

The Bears began their week in dominant fashion, taking advantage of Webster’s defensive mistakes to secure a win over the 16th ranked team in the nation. Sophomore Parker Guthrie started on the mound, holding the Gorloks scoreless for the first two innings before being replaced by sophomore Anderson Gomez.

The Bears got the scoring started in the third inning, with an error from the Gorloks’ shortstop allowing senior Brandon Buday to score. Junior Shane Pellegrino added another run with a sacrifice fly, opening up a 2-0 Bears lead. Webster responded with one run in the top of the fourth, but the Bears were quick to counter.

The Bears scored five runs in the fourth inning on a pair of doubles from sophomore Anthony Equale and graduate student Colter Couillard-Rodak. Graduate student Will Yarbro also added an RBI walk. The Gorloks committed two errors in the inning, allowing the Bears to establish a commanding 7-1 lead. 

The Gorloks made it 7-2 in the sixth, but graduate student Noah Reichman put the game away in the eighth inning. His two-run homerun made the final score 9-2. Junior pitcher Miles Quemuel-Labrador pitched the final four innings for the Bears, earning his sixth win of the season.

Game Two – WashU: 5, Emory: 3 (Eleven Innings)

After playing Webster, the Bears traveled to Atlanta, Georgia, to take on Emory University in a four-game series. The first game of this series was a back-and-forth battle in which the Bears prevailed in extra innings. Pellegrino got the scoring started early with a sacrifice fly in the first inning, giving the Bears a 1-0 lead. The Eagles scored on a sacrifice fly in the third, evening up the score at 1-1. 

The 1-1 score remained until the seventh inning, with senior pitcher Hank Weiss successfully shutting down Emory’s offense. Emory took a 3-1 lead in the seventh. 

The Bears fought back immediately in the top of the eighth, tying up the game on a sacrifice fly from Reichman and an RBI single from Pellegrino. Quemuel-Labrador relieved Weiss and pitched a scoreless eighth inning. In the bottom of the ninth, the Eagles loaded the bases with one out. Guthrie came in to pitch, inducing a clutch double play to send the game to extra innings. 

Guthrie navigated another bases-loaded jam in the bottom of the 10th, keeping the game tied going into the 11th inning. The Bears finally broke through offensively with a pair of singles from sophomore Anthony Equale and first-year Kevin Stephens, giving the Bears a 5-3 lead. Guthrie finished out the bottom of the 11th, earning his first win of the season in a gritty WashU victory. 

Game Three – WashU: 6, Emory: 7

The first game of this Saturday doubleheader was another back-and-forth game, with Emory taking a 1-0 lead in the first inning. The Bears thundered back in the second, jumping out to a 3-1 lead on homers from Equale and first-year Ryan Soong. Gomez came in to pitch in the second inning, and the Eagles scored four runs to regain a 5-3 lead. 

The Bears cut into their deficit in the fourth inning with a sacrifice fly from Equale, bringing them within one run from the Eagles. WashU’s power surge continued in the fifth inning, with senior Braden Mazone crushing a two-run homer to give the Bears a 6-5 lead. This lead did not last long, as the Eagles tied up the game 6-6 with an RBI groundout in the bottom of the fifth. 

The score remained tied until the ninth inning, with Gomez pitching seven innings and only giving up one run before being replaced by sophomore Owen Block in the ninth. Block surrendered a walk-off single, ending the game in a loss for the Bears.

Game Four – WashU: 5, Emory: 1

The Bears fell behind 1-0 in the first inning again, with Emory scoring on a sacrifice fly. Junior pitcher Isaac Zhang settled in from there, not allowing another run in his 4 ⅓ innings of work. He was relieved by senior pitcher Sebastian Guzman, who held the Eagles scoreless for the remaining 4 ⅔ innings of the game.

The Bears’ offense was dormant until the sixth inning, finally breaking through with a game-tying RBI double from Yarbro. The Bears added two more runs in the inning and scored insurance runs in the seventh and ninth innings to make the score 5-1. Guzman picked up his fourth win of the season, putting the Bears in an advantageous position to win the series. 

Game Five – WashU: 4, Emory: 5

With a chance to take the series on Sunday, the Bears got out to a hot start, taking advantage of Emory’s defensive miscues. After Couillard-Rodak reached first base on a defensive error in the first, Reichman hit him in to make the score 1-0. In the second, Mazone reached on an error, coming around to score after a third error by the Eagles Equale added an RBI single for the Bears’ third run, and first-year Cooper Greene scored the fourth. This extended the Bears’ lead to 4-0, with sophomore pitcher Townsend Stephenson shutting down Emory’s offense.

Stephenson threw six innings in the game, allowing no runs and just three hits. After throwing 111 pitches, Stephenson was replaced by Quemuel-Labrador in the seventh inning. The Eagles fought back for two runs in the seventh inning, with Guthrie coming in to pitch to end the inning. 

Guthrie remained on the mound in the ninth inning, attempting to close out a series victory for the Bears. After a leadoff walk, the Eagles tied the game with a homerun. Subsequently, Emory ended the game in a 5-4 Bears’ loss with another walkoff single. 

With this loss, the Bears finished the regular season at 25-15. The Bears’ pitching staff led the highly competitive UAA in ERA. Despite dropping from third place to fourth place in the UAA this year, the Bears’ current ranking gives them a strong chance of receiving their first NCAA tournament bid since 2021 on Monday, May 12.