This past week the John Carroll University Baseball team went 3-1 in their first week of Ohio Athletic Conference play, highlighted by a sweep of the Wilmington College Fightin’ Quakers on Saturday, April 2. 

Thanks to timely pitching and a red-hot offense, the Blue Streaks head into the second week of OAC play in a five-way tie for first in conference standings. 

The Blue Streaks were coming off a doubleheader split against Muskingum, while the Fightin’ Quakers were coming off a split as well, with an impressive win over  D3baseball.com’s No.9 ranked Baldwin Wallace. The Blue Streaks won the first game 14-13, and the second game 12-10. 

Joseph Olsavsky ‘24 was awarded Hitter of the Week by the Ohio Athletic Conference for his performance all week, including a record-setting game in the second game against Wilmington. 

Because of weather conditions earlier in the week, John Carroll moved the location of Saturday’s doubleheader to Austintown-Fitch High School in Austintown, Ohio. The smaller field paid dividends to the Blue & Gold offense as they hit seven home runs, six alone in game two. 

Game 1: John Carroll 14-13

The first half of game one was a pitcher’s duel, until it became an offensive slugfest. 

Coming off of a doubleheader Tuesday where the team scored 15 runs against Muskingum, the Blue Streaks’ offense caught on fire once again, starting in the bottom of the fifth. 

RBI doubles by Henry Haracz ‘22 and Olsavsky made the score 2-0. Graduate student Andrew Steele went out for his sixth inning of work after an extremely efficient first five innings. 

The Quaker offense woke up as well, as they scored seven runs off of a combination of Steele, Matthew Aukerman ‘23, and graduate student Duncan Cappar. Steele’s final line was a no decision with four earned runs, one walk, one hit by a pitch and three strikeouts. The fifth-year senior currently ranks third on the team in strikeouts. 

With the pressure now fully on the Blue Streak offense they answered with nine runs in the bottom of the sixth. 

John Carroll tied up the game, and quickly took the lead as Landen Glaser ‘22 cleared the bases, earning three RBIs. One batter later, graduate student Bennett Cavaretta singled Glaser home to make it 11-7 going into the seventh. 

Joe Smith ‘22 took the hill and got a quick out and a weak pop up, but when the pop up landed between three defenders, the Quaker offense took advantage of the opportunity scoring four runs to tie the game before Owen Gerba ‘25, who leads the team in appearances, got a fly out to the right field to end the threat. 

The score remained tied as Garrett Siegel ‘22 took the hill at the top of the eight. 

Siegel, who leads among pitchers who have more than one inning pitched, with a 3.00 ERA, got a 6-4-3 double play to erase a one out single to end the inning. 

The Blue Streaks rode that momentum into the bottom half of the inning, as Glaser hit a home run to dead center, as Wilmington’s center fielder jumped to make a would-be fantastic grab, but it bounced off his glove and over the fence. 

Siegel took the hill for the ninth for the first time in his JCU career, but gave up two singles to start the inning. 

Sylvan Wiley ‘24 took the mound and after a sac bunt, surrendered a double down the left-field line to push Wilmington ahead 13-12 before getting the top of the order out with two flyouts. 

After a walk and two singles, the leadoff hitter Olsavsky stepped up to the plate and hit a two RBI double down the left-field line to win the game for the Blue Streaks. 

Wiley was credited with the win, and Erik Daugenti led the way offensively with four hits. The Blue Streaks struggled with strikeouts early in the season, but struck out as an offense just twice in game one. 

Game Two: John Carroll 12-10

Heading into game two the Blue Streaks handed the ball to Jon Ambro ‘22. 

Ambro gave up six runs, five earned, in three innings, and it became a battle of the bullpen once again. 

Down 6-3 in the bottom of the fourth the Blue Streaks were dying to gain back some momentum. It came by the hand of Olsavsky, knocking a towering two run homer to put the Streaks back within one. 

After two scoreless innings of relief from Gerba and Sam Basso ‘24, John Carroll handed the game to ace starter Mitch Midea ‘22. While Wilmington scored twice to make it 8-5, the Blue Streaks answered the bell once again.

Olsavsky hit another two run homer to left center, and it was followed up by a game tying solo home run by Ben Surman. The two Pittsburgh natives have been a spark plug at the top of the order for JCU all season. They each are hitting above .300 and are each in the top three on the team in home runs.

“We’ve battled adversity all year,” said Olsavsky. “This was the definition of bouncing back no matter what the situation is and that will be the story of our season. “

The Fightin’ Quakers were able to score off Midea once again on a two run home run in the top of the seventh. 

John Carroll answered once again, with back-to-back-to-back home runs by Haracz, Matt Springer ‘22, and Olsavsky’s third home run of the day in his straight at bat.

That would be all Midea needed as he finished the game with two scoreless innings, ending with six strikeouts in four innings of his first relief appearance of his John Carroll career. Midea moved to third in the OAC in strikeouts. 

Cavaretta hit a sac fly to give the Streaks an insurance run, and the final score was 12-10. 

“I said to the team our next challenge was getting over the hump of sweeping a double header after a split on Tuesday. They answered that challenge with two great team wins. We are playing extremely confident right now, but we still need to improve everyday to get where we want to go with 21 regular season games left,” said John Carroll Head Coach Bobby Bell. 

Olsavsky was the story in game two at the plate for JCU. 

He set new single game records in hits (5), home runs (3) and total bases (15). His six RBIs also tied the single game record owned by teammate Justin Hanley ’22. 

Olsavsky was awarded the Hitter of the Week by the OAC this past Monday, and leads the team in hits, doubles, RBIs, total bases, and walks. His four home runs are tied for first with Glaser, who leads qualifying hitters in slugging percentage. 

Despite giving up 27 hits and 23 runs in both games, the Blue Streaks came out on top to be tied with four other teams at the top of the OAC with a 3-1 conference record.

The Blue Streaks have a tough schedule coming up, as they have seven games in eight days. Six of those games will be conference doubleheaders. 

They hope to play their first games of the season at Schweickert Field on Saturday, April 9, with a doubleheader against Ohio Northern. Estimated start times for each game are 1 p.m. and 4 p.m.