Hamline Baseball recorded their first conference win of the season last Thursday in game two of their doubleheader against the Augsburg Auggies at Midway Stadium.

In the bottom of the ninth inning, junior Cam Smith was at the plate on a full count with bases loaded. Smith laid off the pitch and it was ruled a ball by the umpire. The runner on third base, junior Matt Connell, advanced home for the game winning run to end the game at 7-6.

The victory was the Pipers’ first conference win of the season and luckily ended a six-game losing streak.

The Pipers opened the 2014 season with two victories in Missouri when they swept Iowa Wesleyan, winning 13-1 and 11-0. In both games, the Pipers’ defense was mistake free.

Connell’s play during those two games earned him the MIAC Baseball Player of the Week with five recorded hits, five RBI’s and three runs with a .625 batting average.

The Pipers, at 2-0, traveled to Arizona to play the eight games that preceded their conference opener.

In Arizona, the Pipers went 4-4. Their biggest victory was a 27-3 win over Lawrence.

For first-year Collin Olstad, the trip in Arizona was his first glimpse of college baseball action where he had his first at bat against Lawrence.

“It was a little nerve wracking, but I hit a fly ball to center field,” Olstad said. “It was just nice to get my first hit out the way. I hit a double, left-center gap and a double is always good.”

Returning from Arizona, the Pipers were 6-4 overall before playing St. Mary’s. In the first game, the Pipers were shutout 6-0. However, in the second game, the Pipers put runs on the board and had the game tied at 9 before the game was suspended due to darkness. The game is scheduled to be continued on April 24.

Following St. Mary’s, the Pipers were swept in the St. Thomas double header losing 2-7 and 3-8 last Monday, dropping the Pipers to a 0-3 conference record.

The Pipers bounced back in their home series against the Auggies last Thursday.

Game one of the double header went into extra innings after the Pipers batted in a run in the bottom of the seventh inning to tie the game at 3. The Auggies regained the lead in the top of the eighth inning after scoring on an error, they led 4-3.

Olstad led off the eighth inning with a single. After a sacrifice bunt, he advanced to second base. After the second out, Connell stepped into the batter’s box and delivered the hit that brought Olstad home for the tying run. The game again was tied at 4 going into the ninth inning.

The Auggies responded in the ninth inning with the final run of the game to win 5-4.

“The reason we lost the first game was because of little mistakes,” Olstad said. “The errors and stuff will kill you because obviously we would have won easily, but we just kept giving them runs.”

The Pipers committed four errors in the first game as they had trouble adjusting to the wind. The errors gave the Auggies extra opportunities to drive in more runs. In the second game, that was not the case for the Pipers as the defense played error free.

The Pipers held an early lead, winning 6-1. However, the Auggies rallied in the fifth inning scoring five runs to tie the game at 6. Both teams remained scoreless until the bottom of the ninth inning when Smith was walked with bases loaded, which advanced Connell from third base to home plate.

Olstad was relieved with the team’s first conference victory of the season.

“It was great; it was a little weight off our shoulders. We just got to keep going forward, and take one game at a time,” he said.

Olstad explained he isn’t too worried about the team’s slow start in conference this season.

“[Record wise] it looks bad, but we’ve been in every game [that] we’ve played,” Olstad said.

Olstad elaborated and said he felt there were games where they let things slip away on defense. He said one in particular was the series against the Tommies.

“We kind of gave those games away too,” he said.

On defense the Pipers weren’t as crisp and faced similar difficulties as they did in game one against the Auggies. Olstad explained that last Friday the team ran a special practice that focused on defense, so they could have similar results as they did in game two against the Auggies, when they were error free.

Olstad believes that the little changes can go a long way and with it being early in the season they’re not far off from where they want to be.

“Our goals are still in reach. We still want to have an above .500 season,” he said. “We’d like to make it to the playoffs. I want to play St. Thomas again; that’s one of our goals because we know they’ll be there at the end of the season… I think we have a good chance of beating them.”