Box Score 1 | Box Score 2

LACEY, Wash. – Any win's a great win, and the Crusaders grabbed two on Saturday.

Jesse Hilyard ripped a lead-off double in the top of the 10^th inning and hustled home on a groundout to shortstop off the bat of Ben Circeo, giving the Crusaders a 4-3 win in 10 innings and sparking a sweep of a Great Northwest Athletic Conference twinbill at St. Martin's on Saturday.

Jake Reppert (5-2) struck out seven in a complete-game, 9-1 victory in the nightcap for Northwest Nazarene, which plays another GNAC doubleheader against the Saints on Monday at 1 p.m. (MT).

"I think our guys are starting to enjoy the feeling of playing together," NNU head baseball coach Rocke Musgraves said. "Today I wouldn't say we played well, but in the game of baseball you've got to have good bad-days and I think we had a pretty good bad-day."
 

Tyler Davis started the day very well for NNU (20-18, 9-9 GNAC), putting the Crusaders up quickly 1-0 with his fifth home run in eight days in the top of the first inning of the opener.

A Tate Glasgow RBI sacrifice fly follow by a Tucker Campbell RBI single to right then put the Crusaders up 3-0 in the fourth inning.

That appeared to be plenty for NNU ace righty Colben McGuire, who struck out seven in the hill, cruising through 8 2-3 innings.

But a two-run rally in the fifth kept the Saints (13-19, 7-11) close, and an unearned run in the bottom of the seventh tied it, 3-3.

Colton Loomis (4-1) took over in the bottom of the ninth and worked the 10^th in relief for the win; a win created when Hilyard stepped to the plate and blasted his second double of the game just inside the bag at third and down the left-field line.

Glasgow sacrificed Hilyard to third and with one out, Circeo's slow grounder to short plating the game winner.
 

In the nightcap, NNU's offense erupted for four runs in the second, sparked by a Kaleb DeHaas lead-off homer, and the Crusaders never looked back.

Despite struggling at times on the hill, Reppert (5-2) still managed to overwhelm the Saints hitters in a three-hit, complete-game win as he struck out seven.

"In Game 2, Reppert really, really had to grind 'cause he wasn't feeling his release point and he wasn't pitching with a lot of confidence, but he found a way to get 21 outs and I'm proud of him for that," Musgraves said.

Making it a bit easier was a ton of offense as the Crusaders broke open the 4-0 ballgame with a five-run fifth that saw Hilyard make it 5-0 with an RBI base on balls, Circeo chase home a run with a fielder's choice, Campbell plate a run with a double and Tim Jones plate two with a double to center.

Jones finished the game going 2-for-3 with four RBIs for NNU.