Game 1 Box Score
Game 2 Box Score

HANOVER, N.H. -- After dropping game one of the Ivy League Championship Series to Dartmouth, 8-6, the Cornell baseball team rebounded for a thrilling 14-12 win in game two, forcing a decisive game three on Sunday in Hanover, N.H. The Big Red slugged 28 hits, including six home runs, as the two teams combined to put a whopping 40 runs on the board on the day.

Freshman Frank Hager led four players in batting .500 or better on the day, going 4-for-7 with a double, a home run, four runs batted in and three runs scored. Classmate Brian Billigen went 5-for-10 with a double, four runs scored, a home run of his own and two driven in. Both junior Matt Langseth and sophomore Mickey Brodsky went 4-for-8 on the day, with Brodsky hitting a pair of doubles, scoring once and driving in three.

The day wasn't as nice for the Big Red pitching staff, which posted a 9.00 earned-run average on the day. Relievers Mike Carroll and junior David Rochefort were the only two to come out of the day unscathed, with Carroll working 2.1 innings and Rochefort working a pair of scoreless innings in game two for his eighth save of the year. Mickey Brodsky worked two innings of relief in game two to pick up the victory, while Jadd Schmeltzer was tagged with the loss in game one.

Cornell (17-22) got out early in game one, as each of the first four batters reached base. Brodsky drove in a pair on his single to left-center, but Dartmouth (24-15) escaped the inning when Hager lined into a triple play, as both Nathan Ford and Brodsky were caught in no-man's land between bases.

The score would stay that way until the fifth inning when the Big Red struck for four more runs to take a 6-0 lead. With one out, Adam Jacobs hit a towering triple off the wall in center field, and was driven home when Billigen crushed his first career home run over the wall in right, easily clearing the fence that listed 342 feet down the line. Scott Hardinger followed with a triple of his own into the right-field corner and scored on Hager's two-out single to left-center. Ford, who had walked, then scored on Domenic Di Ricco's single to right, staking the Big Red to a 6-0 lead.

That lead came apart in the bottom half of the fifth, as Dartmouth struck for seven runs as the Big Red's defense unraveled. Four singles and a triple, coupled with two Cornell errors and a runner taking first on a wild pitch, saw the Big Green plate seven men, though only four of those were earned. Schmeltzer couldn't make it out of the inning, making way for Mike Carroll, who got Nicholas Santopadre to fly out to center to end the nightmarish inning.

Dartmouth gained an insurance run in the eighth, loading the bases off of Stephen Osterer on a pair of singles and an intentional walk, but a hit-batsman forced home the eighth run of the game.

Schmeltzer allowed four earned runs over 4.2 innings, giving up eight hits while walking two but striking out eight. Carroll worked 2.1 innings of perfect relief, fanning a pair, while Osterer allowed one run on two hits in the ninth.

With Dartmouth scoring eight unanswered runs in the game one loss, the question of how the Big Red would respond was answered early in game two. Matt Hill, the game two starter, got a pair of strikeouts and some help on a caught-stealing by Adam Jacobs to work through the first inning, and Billigen turned a leadoff bunt into a two-base error, as his bunt down the first-base line was gloved by first baseman Mike Pagliarulo and thrown down the left field line to nobody. Billigen raced around to reach third easily, scoring on Hardinger's sacrifice fly to the wall in right. Ford then walked and moved to third on Brodsky's double down the left-field line before Hager smashed a home run to left field, giving Cornell an early 4-0 lead.

Dartmouth got a run back in the second, scoring on a sacrifice fly, but Cornell kept the offense going, adding three more runs in the bottom half of the second. As the top of the order went double-single-double-single, Billigen, Hardinger and Ford all scored as the Big Red opened up a six-run lead for the second straight game.

The Big Green again cut into the deficit, this time with Jeff Onstott's two-run home run in the third making the score 7-3. Cornell got out of the inning on a fly-out double play, taking advantage of a baserunning gaffe to double up Nick Santomauro off second, who had left early while trying to tag up.

Dartmouth again put together a big inning in the fifth, scoring five runs and sending nine men to the plate to take an 8-7 lead. Nathan Ford then led off the bottom half of the inning with a home run to left, and the Big Red then added to the lead with Nate David's home run to left-center, scoring himself and Hager to give the Big Red a 10-8 lead.

That lead would be short-lived, as Dartmouth put another four runs on the board in the sixth, piecing together another big inning without the aid of a big hit. A 1-2-3 sixth left Cornell down, 12-10, as the Cornell bullpen tandem of Brodsky and went to work. Brodsky got the Big Green out with only a single in the seventh. In the bottom half of the inning, David gave the Big Red the lead back for good, hitting his second straight home run over the wall in left-center, scoring Hager and Di Ricco and making the score 13-12. After Dartmouth got the leadoff runner on base in the eighth, Rochefort came on and got out of the inning, aided by some heads-up fielding from Hardinger and Ford. With Dartmouth DH Ray Allen on third with one out, center fielder Jake Carlson hit a grounder to short. Hardinger went to look Allen back to third, but noticed he had strayed too far off the bag. Hardinger flipped to Ford, who laid the tag on the retreating Allen for the second out. Rochefort then got catcher Kyle Evans to fly out to center to end the inning.

Hardinger then added an insurance run with his first home run of the season in the bottom of the eighth, allowing a two-out hit but getting league batting champion Santomauro to strike out looking to end the game. Despite allowing the 17 hits in the game, Cornell held Santomauro 0-for-5 on the game, the first time this season that he has gone hitless in five at-bats in a single game.

The two teams will return to the field at Biondi Park on Sunday for the deciding game three of the Ivy League Championship Series. First pitch is scheduled for 1 p.m., with the winner earning the Ivy League's automatic berth in the NCAA tournament.