UW-Platteville Picks Up First Win of 2012 Season

The University of Wisconsin-Platteville baseball team picked up its first win of the 2012 campaign with an 8-5 win over Buena Vista on Friday afternoon in Jacksonville, Illinois.

The Pioneers (1-2) scored twice in the first, third, fifth and seventh inning en route to the win. UW-Platteville had 10 hits in the win, including three from Levi Ney, who went 3-for-3 with four RBI and three runs scored. Ney had a triple and home run in the first and third inning, respectively. He added a single in the fifth before Buena Vista elected to walk the hot-hitting left fielder.

The Beavers (2-5) outhit UW-Platteville by an 11 to 10 margin but stranded 14 base runners in the loss.

Each team plated two runs in first inning and Buena Vista took a brief 3-2 lead in the second inning until the Pioneers regained the lead with a two-run third inning and for the rest of the contest. In the third, UW-Platteville went ahead on a two-run homerun by Ney. They added two more runs in the fifth with a RBI single by Ney and a RBI groundout by Zach Demmon that stretched the lead to 6-3 for UW-Platteville.

Despite surrendering a run in the sixth to Buena Vista that trimmed the lead to 6-4, the Pioneers answered with two more in the seventh on a two-RBI single by Jesse Wiley to stretch the lead to 8-4. With the four-run lead, UW-Platteville brought in Grant Oldenburg to pitch in relief of winning pitcher Bill Oppriecht.

Oldenburg pitched the final three innings of three-hit relief and struck out three for his first save. Oppriecht, who pitched the first six innings, scattered eight hits and struck out four for his first win of the season.

The Pioneers will wrap up the weekend in Jacksonville with another contest against Buena Vista (1 pm) and a matchup against North Central (4 pm) on Saturday.