Things didn't look good for the baseball team late Saturday afternoon. Down four in the bottom of the eighth inning, Brown was six outs away from being swept in a doubleheader by Harvard, which entered the series tied with Brown for the Red Rolfe Division lead with a 7-3 record.
That all changed with a swing of bat and a gust of wind.
With three home runs - including a game-tying grand slam Saturday and game-winning blast Sunday - over the weekend, third baseman Robert Papenhause '08 led the Bears to a pair of comeback victories over the visiting Crimson.
In a four-game series that featured some clutch hitting and pitching but poor defense and baserunning, the Bears split a four-game series with Harvard that was often tense and emotional. As a result, both teams remain tied atop the division with 9-5 league records with only one week left in the season.
"It was a great series," said Head Coach Marek Drabinski. "What we had here were two good teams going at it and we had a split."
In Saturday's first game, the Bears, now 14-17 overall, sent Jeff Dietz '08 to the mound. But the right-hander ran into some difficulty against the Crimson lineup. Dietz gave up a first-inning home run to Steffan Wilson, and Harvard (now 14-15 overall) added on three runs in the third thanks to a combination of singles, a walk and an error.
Brown tried to catch up, scoring two runs in the bottom of the third, with one run coming off Papenhause's home run to left, but Harvard scored three more runs in the top of the sixth to seal the 7-3 victory.
The Bears responded with a strong start in Saturday's second game. After starter James Cramphin '07 gave up a first-inning run, Brown scored three runs in the third off Shawn Haviland. Two runs came on the first collegiate home run of his career by Brad Rifkin '09.
Brown scored again in the fourth to take a 4-1 lead, and the score remained that way until the seventh, when Harvard scored four runs. Matt Rogers burned Cramphin for a two-run homer and Matt Vance, who went 11-for-16 in the series with seven RBIs, added a two-run double. The Crimson added three runs in the eighth to take an 8-4 lead.
Crimson closer Jake Bruton entered in the bottom of the eighth but gave up a leadoff triple to Matt Nuzzo '09 and walked the next two batters to set up Papenhause's stunning grand slam. The third baseman lofted a ball into right field that, with some help from the wind, seemed to float higher and higher before finding its way over the fence.
"The way the field goes, if you can get the ball in the air to the right, it usually carries very well," Papenhause said. "I was hoping it would get out, but I wasn't really positive."
The Bears ended up batting around in the inning, scoring four more runs, three off a Dietz homer that was also aided by the wind. Rob Hallberg '08 pitched the last one and two-thirds innings to pick up the win in the 12-8 victory.
Drabinksi said he was proud of his players' come-from-behind victory.
"Things looked bleak, without a doubt, going into the eighth with (Harvard's) closer coming in, but these guys never give up," he said.
Brown carried the momentum into Sunday's first game. The Crimson touched Bears starter Will Weidig '10 for a single run in the second and then in the third, when Vance smoked a homer to left. But the Bears tied the game in the bottom of the fourth against Harvard southpaw Eric Eadington. Chris Tanabe '10 led off with a single, and Dietz moved him to third with a double. Tanabe scored on Nuzzo's groundout and Dietz scored on a wild pitch.
The game remained tied until the bottom of the sixth. With two outs, Nuzzo doubled and tri-captain Bryan Tews '07 walked, setting up another dramatic situation for, well, guess who?
This time, Papenhause left no doubt. He uppercutted the first pitch he saw from Eadington into left field, sending the Bears dugout into a frenzy.
"Pap is really starting to hit," Drabinski said.
Weidig came out in the top of the seventh to try for his second complete game of the year, but allowed the first two runners to reach. Drabinski then called Hallberg into the game. Hallberg calmly got the last three outs of the 5-2 win for his second save of the season.
The Bears carried the momentum from the consecutive comebacks into the final game of the series, but only briefly. Brown took a 2-0 lead in the first on consecutive doubles by tri-captain Devin Thomas '07, Dietz and Nuzzo. But that was all the Bears had going for them as they regressed into their early-season form, making blunders on defense and on the basepaths.
In the top of the third, starter Alex Silverman '08 gave up six runs, four unearned. The Crimson got five hits in the inning but was aided by two fielding errors and a run-scoring wild pitch. Silverman was taken out in the top of the fourth after giving up a no-doubt-about-it home run to Griff Jenkins, the Crimson's No. 9 hitter.
Trailing 9-3 in the bottom of the fifth, and one run already in, the Bears had runners on second and third with one out. Thomas hit a deep fly ball that was caught at the warning track in right-center. But Ryan Murphy '08 was easily doubled up at second base, ending the inning. The Bears never seriously threatened again and fell 9-4.
Tews said the team needed to work on its defense and baserunning this week, and Papenhause called the loss "frustrating."
"If we had won that second game we would have had a two-game lead with six games left against teams I'm pretty confident we're going to beat," Papenhause said.
Both Brown and Harvard have six league games left. On Wednesday, both the Bears and the Crimson will play makeup doubleheaders that were postponed because of weather. The Bears will be at Dartmouth, the Crimson at Yale. The two teams will switch opponents for their final four-game series this weekend.
If Brown and Harvard are still tied for first at the end of the regular season, the teams will play a one-game playoff at a neutral site. The winner would advance to play a three-game series against the winner of the Lou Gehrig division for the Ivy League championship.
Tews said he wasn't overly concerned that the Bears lost a chance to take control of the division.
"We control our own destiny," Tews said. "If we win six games, the worst we can do is force a playoff with Harvard."
The Bears' failure to win the Harvard series, combined with the rescheduling of the Dartmouth games, means they will have to ask a lot of their starting pitchers this week. Normally, Dietz and Cramphin pitch Saturday league games and Weidig and Silverman pitch Sunday games, with all four pitchers getting six days of rest between. But with the Bears needing to win every league game possible, Drabinksi said Dietz and Cramphin will pitch at Dartmouth on only three days' rest, and then they will bounce back to throw against Yale on Sunday, also on three days' rest. Weidig will pitch Saturday's first game against the Bulldogs, and, after Silverman's disastrous outing, Drabinski said the coaches will meet to see who will take the fourth spot in the rotation.
