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IOWA CITY, Iowa — A seven-run first inning propelled the University of Iowa baseball team to a 15-1 victory over Cornell College in its home opener Tuesday in front of 1,059 fans at Duane Banks Field.
The Hawkeyes scored a season-high 15 runs to improve to 6-1 on the year.
Iowa got off to a quick start in the first, jumping out to a 2-0 lead on a two-run double from Tyler Cropley. A two-out Cornell error then turned costly, as the Hawkeyes ended up sending 13 batters to the plate in the first.
After Cropley scored on the error, sophomore Lorenzo Elion had an RBI single and sophomore Justin Jenkins had a two-run double to push the lead to 6-0. The final run came off a Kyle Crowl RBI single, stretching the advantage to 7-0.
The Hawkeyes added two more runs in the second and fourth innings on Elion sacrifice flies before breaking the game open six in the seventh. Zion Pettigrew had an RBI single and Iowa’s final two runs came on a two-run single from freshman Brett McCleary.
Freshman Trenton Wallace earned the victory in his first career starting, allowing zero runs on four hits over three innings. Jack Dreyer, Derek Lieurance, Kole Kampen, Grant Leonard, and Ben Probst all had clean innings of work.
Iowa struck out 12 in the game while issuing one walk.
QUOTING IOWA HEAD COACH RICK HELLER
“The game went as well as we could have planned. We were able to jump on them right away, scoring seven in the first. We were able to get a lot of young guys to come in and pitch. It was a good day overall.”
OF NOTE…
– Every position player on the Iowa roster saw action with nine different Hawkeyes recording a hit. McCleary tallied his first career multi-hit game, finishing 2-for-3 with two runs and two RBIs.
– Jenkins and Elion had three RBIs each, while Crowl, Tanner Wetrich, and McCleary scoring two runs apiece.
– Pitchers Derek Lieurance and Kole Kampen made their Hawkeye debuts, pitching the seventh and eighth innings. Neither gave up a hit and both had one strikeout.
– The crowd of 1,059 was Iowa’s second straight home opener with 1,000-plus. The Hawkeyes had 1,312 last season in its home opener.
UP NEXT
The Hawkeyes (6-1) return to action Friday, opening a three-game weekend series at UAB. First pitch is set for 4 p.m. (CT).
FOLLOW THE HAWKEYES
Stay up-to-date on all the happenings with the Iowa baseball program on social media via Twitter (@UIBaseball), Instagram/UIBaseball, and Facebook/IowaBaseball.
