MILWAUKEE, Wis. –
Nate DeYoung belted a grand slam and the Milwaukee baseball team scored eight runs in the second inning on its way to a 14-3 victory over Purdue Fort Wayne on Sunday afternoon.
"You know it is going to be hard to pitch and get outs so making sure we took advantage of all those base runners we had early," head coach
Scott Doffek commented. "Nate hitting that home run gave us some cushion and relaxed the dugout."
Quinton Morris put the Panthers (7-12, 7-5 Horizon League) on the board first as he laced a double to the wall to score DeYoung, who led off with a single.
Mitchell Buban followed with an RBI single before
Marcus Cline and
Zach Nogalski each drove in a run to make it 4-0.
After
Jack Kraus reached to load the bases, DeYoung recorded his second hit of the inning, a blast over the right center wall to make it 8-0.
Purdue Fort Wayne (7-12, 4-8 Horizon League) responded with three runs in the top of the third inning, but Milwaukee matched that in the bottom half and led 11-3 through three innings.
Jack Mahoney then took over for
James Severson on the mound and picked up the win, striking out seven and allowing just two hits across four innings.
"He threw the ball well. He's certainly capable of being dynamic on the mound," Doffek said. "It's just a matter of him being able to repeat. Today, he was pretty darn good."
Milwaukee plated single runs in the fifth, sixth, and seventh innings and
Nick Gilhaus and
David Williams each pitched a clean inning to shut down the Mastodons.
DeYoung finished the day 2-for-4 with five runs batted in. The fourth inning shot marked the second of the season for the sophomore.
Buban reached base five times, going 3-for-3 with a pair of walks.
Conner Goodman and
Nick Winter each had two hits for the Panthers.
The Horizon League sweep marked the first for the Panthers since taking all three games against Northern Kentucky in 2019.
Milwaukee will next hit the road as they head to Rochester, Michigan to take on Oakland. Game one is set for 1:00 pm on Thursday, April 1. Live coverage links can be found on
MKEPanthers.com.