UPLAND, Ind.—Southeastern ran its Opening Round win streak to 12 by sweeping the Upland Bracket hosted by Taylor University with a 9-5 win over fourth-seeded Bryan in Thursday night's championship game.
"Any time you can go back to a World Series, it's an awesome opportunity," said coach
Adrian Dinkel. "It's hard to get there no matter how want to spin it, it's hard and these guys did a great job and get another opportunity to compete for a national championship."
In his first start since February 8
th,
Bryce Moyle went six innings allowing just one run on one hit with a season-high 10 strikeouts and just one walk to improve to 3-0 on the year.
"He came out and did an unbelievable job and gave us a chance to win that game," said Dinkel.
With his team leading 1-0, thanks to an RBI fielder's choice by
Luis Cabrera in the top of the second, Moyle struck out the side in the bottom of the inning. More run support came his way in the third with a two-run single by
Gary Lora, then two more runs came in on throwing error with two outs in the inning to make it 5-0 heading to the bottom of the third.
"Going into a championship game, you just want to calm your nerves, you're already going to be pumped up and maintaining to go long in a game and give your offense a chance," said Moyle. "I got onto the corners, I was able to sink it pretty well, my curveball was good, and later I was able to show a slider, so it was a big deal."
A two-out RBI single up the middle in the bottom of the fourth was the only run allowed by Moyle on the day.
Isaac Nunez made it 6-1 in the fifth with an RBI fielder's choice, then in the sixth
Brian Fuentes' 20
th home run of the season brought in three runs to put the Fire up 9-1.
The Lions made a late push, getting two in the seventh on an RBI single to left and a dropped fly ball, then got a two-run single to right in the ninth and had two on with two outs until
Ronnie Voacolo came in to strike out the lone batter he faced to secure the win.
Lora and
Jose Marcano led the offense with two hits each.
The bracket for the World Series will be released Friday evening once the final four opening rounds are completed.
