CHICAGO, Ill. -- North Park's Vikings lost to the Vikings of Augustana on Monday evening in an extra-inning heartbreaker by a score of 16-11. North Park slugged their way to a 10-8 lead by the 7th inning after going down 0-8 in the 4th, but control struggles down the stretch ultimately cost them the chance of victory.
Logan Peters made his return from the injury list, batting 5th in the order and getting the start for North Park. Peters cruised through the game's first 3 innings but hit rocky waters in the 4th before getting relieved by Zach Lingk. 6 earned and 2 un-earned runs later, North Park saw themselves at risk of getting slaughtered.
The North Park bats responded almost immediately though, putting up 6 runs in the bottom of the 5th followed by 3 in the 6th to erase the deficit. A 2-run single from freshman Alex Divito was the tipping point that gave our Vikings the lead. In the 7th, a Cole Fiorenza triple setup Reece Arakaki to plate North Park's 10th run of the game.
The pitching staff carried this momentum through the 5th to the 7th inning, with Zach Lingk and Brett Brueske combining to shut down Augustana. This momentum would shift sides in the 8th, as Augustana tied the game up on a wild pitch before sitting the North Park bats down 1-2-3 in the bottom half of the inning.
Augustana then took an 11-10 lead in the 9th on a squeeze bunt, but they still had to face the heart of North Park's lineup to secure their win. After 2 quick outs, Justin Swanson kept the 9th alive with a single, bringing star slugger Ranko Stevanovic to the plate. Ranko delivered with a line shot out to the center field gap that scored Swanson on a game-tying triple to even things at 11.
Sadly, things unfolded for North Park's pitching staff in the 10th. Augustana loaded up the bases with 1 out and then proceeded to score 5 runs in the inning, with 3 of those runs arriving via bases loaded walks, and a 4th through a wild pitch. North Park again went down 1-2-3 in the bottom half of the inning to close out the game at a score of 16-11.
The two sides could not have manufactured their runs in more different fashion. North Park tallied 17 hits with 5 extra base hits throughout the game, with Arakaki, Bobby Bartlett, Swanson, Stevanovic, Peters, and Divito all putting up multi-hit games. On Augustana's side, the team collected just 8 hits as a whole and failed to record a single extra base hit on their way to 16 runs. The separating factor here was walks. Augustana racked up 14 of them, which doubled North Park's respectable mark of 7.
Next up for our Vikings is a nighttime matchup on Wednesday with first pitch slated for 6 PM at Holmgren. The Vikings, with a depleted pitching staff following the 10-inning game, will look for a more efficient performance from the mound when they take on Benedictine.
