The Basics

• Score: VCU 7, Dallas Baptist 2
• Records: VCU (38-22), Dallas Baptist (43-14)
• Location: Horner Ballpark – Dallas, Texas
• The Short Story: The Rams just keep on rolling with a 7-2 victory over regional host and #1 seed Dallas Baptist. JoJo Howie took the hill tonight and threw 6.2 innings of strong baseball, while freshmen Brett Hileman and Daane Berezo each had three hit days at the plate for VCU.
  
  
  

How It Happened

• The big inning came in the top of the fourth when VCU plated five runs, tied for the most that Dallas Baptist has given up in an inning this season. Brett Hileman started things off with a two-run single, which was followed up by an RBI double by Jimmy Kerrigan. A run scoring fielder's choice and a wild pitch would bring in the other two runs of the inning.
• Starter JoJo Howie was just as impressive on the mound as the offense was at the plate, going perfect through three innings and tossing 6.2 innings total, striking out four without allowing a walk.
• Vimael Machin singled to centerfield to bring in another run in the fifth, cancelling out a run that the Patriots had scored the inning prior.
• DBU's David Martinelli homered to right field in the bottom of the fifth to climb back within four.
• VCU added an insurance run in the top of the eighth after Daane Berezo singled home Walker Haymaker to make the score 7-2.
• Matt Lees and Daniel Concepcion finished off the game on the mound and sealed the victory for the Rams, their first in an NCAA Tournament since 2003.

Quotable: 

• "It was a great job by our guys tonight.  I'm super excited for VCU tonight.  I thought our guys did especially good with two strikes.  Once the middle of the game came around, I thought we did a good job of making them command the breaking ball a little bit more and that allowed us to string some good AB's together and find some holes.  On the mound, JoJo kept them off-balance and they were unable to string together that big inning and that was really the difference in the game.  I loved the way we came out and competed and acted like we certainly belong here." -Head Coach Shawn Stiffler
• "I felt like after we lost the second game to St. Louis there was a lot of doubt on our team and we just wanted to get out of there.  We wanted to get home and restart and that's really what we did.  We got back on the plane, flew home, and we sat down as a group and looked each other in the eyes and said we got to do this.  We have to win four out of our next six to even get out of the conference tournament and we knew what we had to do.  We grinded through practice and games and we're right now in the postseason." -Freshman Brett Hileman
• "I think I was able to get them out on their front foot early and get some outs early on against them, but they definitely settled in and starting taking good swings against me.  They made me make good pitches.  If I didn't make a good pitch, they hit it.  They forced me to be good and if I wasn't good, they were going to hurt me." -Senior JoJo Howie

Up Next

• VCU advances to the winner's bracket and will play Oregon State tomorrow at 7 PM ET.