February 19, 2007

Jason Glushon

Entry 1

Well, the Eagles are off and flying. Two in the books, and two wins under our belts heading into a fun, Rawlings Tournament Weekend.

From the diamond of Chappell Park, mirror images of one another occurred both Saturday and Sunday, with the same 3-2 scores and same hits for both teams. On Opening Day, Frank Pfister's 3 hits and Dave Hissey's 2 hits set the offensive tone early, scoring all three runs in the first three innings. Frank, Zander [Sotiriou], and CornDog [Tim Cournoyer] each contributed RBI singles. Congrats to Dan Molnar and Matt McDonough to become the first freshman to start opening day since three years ago to the day, when Taylor Gettinger and Justin Gordon started opening day in a 12-4 win over the University of the South on February 17, 2004.

In that game, Will Carr got the win, Andrew Pinckney and Gettinger added three hits, and Adam Schorr went four for four with three RBIs. How about that?

After taking the lead 3-2 in the bottom of the third, we held onto the lead the rest of the way, with Rich Babb closing the door to record his first save of the year, fifth of his career.

On Sunday, Ian Ganzer took the bump and delivered in a good way, going the distance while striking out eight batters. Offensively, Pfister and Hissey stayed hot at the plate, each contributing RBIs and two hits each. Joe Roth added two hits on the day.

Steve Bralver made his first start of his Eagles career, going two for four from the plate including his first ever Eagles' hit and a double to right field. With the scored tied at two in the bottom of the seventh, Brandon Custer led off the inning with a solo home run, the eventual game-winner, the first of his long Emory career. Congrats to BCust, and hope the wait was worth it!

Did you know that it took Brandon Custer 153 at bats to hit his first Emory home run. The Emory career record for most at bats until their first collegiate home run is Justin Gordon, who took 410 at bats before his first at Maryville last year. Honorable mention in second place is Paul Myslinski, who had 348 at bats before his first career home run during senior day at Chappell Park in 2004.

Shout out to Tommy Dugan and Jake Ornstein for making their first Eagle appearances on Sunday. Welcome to the show, baby!

We will take one week off with our "Who Should be in the Hall of Fame," feature, but don't worry, I've got a good one for next Monday.

Your 19th ranked Eagles are now 2-0 on the season, and will welcome York and Virginia Wesleyan this upcoming weekend during the annual Rawlings' Tournament. We usually have a great showing of families down at the field, and we wish everyone safe trips and look forward to seeing them very soon.

Jason Glushon is a senior from Encino, Calif. He would love to answer e-mail questions from Emory recruits and fans.