The Bluffton University baseball team dropped their home opener to Hiram, 15-3, at Oberlin College on Thursday, March 14. The Beavers slipped to 5-7 overall, while Hiram stand at 2-7 on the season.
With the Beavers in a 3-0 hole going into the bottom half of the third inning, they were looking to get on the board and into striking distance. They did just that when Jacob Latkofsky(Temperance, MI/Ida) doubled down the left field field line, plating fellow sophomore Reid Ruhl(Hamilton) and making it 3-1 in favor of the Terriers.
Hiram added one more run in the top half of the fourth before Bluffton made it 4-2 when Lenny Winiarski (Cincinnati/LaSalle) lifted a sacrifice fly to center. In the bottom of the fifth, Colin Gregory (Fremont/Clyde) launched his team-best sixth homer of the season, pulling Bluffton to within two runs at 5-3. Hiram responded with four runs in the sixth and three more in the seventh en route to a 15-3 victory on Thursday afternoon.
Gregory's home run was the bright spot for Bluffton as his six homers are four more than anybody else in the Heartland Conference.
A plethora of Beavers saw time on the mound with the Bluffton hurlers surrendering 15 runs and 20 hits at Oberlin. Junior Cam Clark (Cairo/Bath) finished with a team-high four strikeouts while falling to 1-1 on the season.
