The win was a long time in coming for the Muhlenberg baseball team, but even more so for starting pitcher Dave Andrew.

The senior earned his first win in four years as the Mules defeated Moravian, 15-5, to snap a five-game losing streak. Muhlenberg scored in six of the nine innings and posted

Conti slides in ahead of the tag to score on Bettini’s single to center in the second. Conti drove in three runs and scored three.

season highs in runs and hits (19).

With the victory, Muhlenberg clinched the Matte Award for the 2006-07 school year. The Mules have a 10-3 lead over the Greyhounds with five sports (softball, men’s golf, women’s and men’s track and field, women’s tennis) to play. Muhlenberg has now won the all-sports competition four straight years.

Andrew is in his first year pitching for the Mules. “I tried to pitch every year, but was unable to because of a shoulder problem,” he said. “It just worked out this year; my arm seemed ready to come back.”

It certainly seemed ready against the Greyhounds (7-15). Andrew worked the first six innings, allowing only five hits and one run. He retired Moravian’ top hitter, a former national player of the week, on a comebacker with a runner on third and one out in the first, and worked out of a bases-loaded jam in the fifth. With a runner on third in the sixth, Andrew struck out the final batter he faced.

Andrew was helped by an offense that gave him a big early lead with some timely hitting. Senior Ryan Sassaman led off the game with the first of his four singles and scored on a two-out single by senior Pete Oris. Muhlenberg (5-14) scored four more times in the second. Senior A.J. Bettini singled in the first run, and senior Mike Hart (RBI single) and Oris (two-run double) brought in three more with two-out hits.

An RBI groundout by Bettini and Sassaman’s run-scoring single made it 7-0 in the third. The Mules eventually led by as much as 15-1, with freshman Eric Pomroy (two-run double) and sophomore Christian Conti (two-run triple) contributing big extra-base hits in the seventh and eighth, respectively.

“The defense did a fantastic job today, and that gave me the confidence to pitch,” Andrew remarked. “Good offense and good defense – that’s how you win.”

Sassaman’s four hits moved him into fifth place on the program’s all-time list with 137 for his career. Hart and Oris had three hits apiece.

After being held to six runs in its previous three games, Muhlenberg has scored 25 in its last two. The Mules will look to continue their hot hitting the rest of the week, with six Centennial Conference games scheduled in the next six days.

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