CARY, N.C. – Northwest Nazarene just finds a way. The Nighthawks knocked off top overall seed, No. 1-ranked, and defending national champion Tampa 5-3 on Monday, behind another incredible pitching performance and capitalizing on four Spartan errors to advance to the National Semifinals.
NNU will now await the winner of an elimination game between Tampa and UT Tyler. The Spartans and Patriots play on Tuesday night, with the Nighthawks' matchup with the winner set for Wednesday night at 6:00 p.m. ET / 4:00 p.m. MT. NNU needs just one win to advance to the Final Championship Series against the winner of the other side of the bracket, while Tampa/UT Tyler would need to beat the Nighthawks twice to advance.
With Monday's victory, NNU has officially made it farther than any other team in program and school history, becoming the first to reach the national semifinals and be one of the last four teams standing in their sport.
NNU improves to 46-14 on the year, now a full 10 wins clear of the previous program record for a single season. They have also won 31 of their last 35 games, and improve to 41-1 when leading after six innings, 26-1 when leading after seven innings, and 25-0 when leading after eight innings this season.
Tampa suffered just their ninth loss of the season, and tallied just the three runs a couple of days after scoring 20 in their College World Series opener.
From the beginning, the tension and intensity in the ballpark was at incredible heights. In the top of the first inning, NNU starter Ernesto Lugo-Canchola was able to get out of a one-out, bases loaded jam, digging deep to get a pair of swinging strikeouts to end the threat.
He then locked in, retiring the side in order in the second, third, and fourth innings. With two outs in the fifth, he had set down 13 Spartans in a row after the single and two walks in the first frame.
Tampa was able to put a few good swings on the ball after that, though, as they hit back-to-back solo homers with two outs to take a 2-0 lead. Another Spartan walked to put a runner on first, but Lugo-Canchola ended the inning with another strikeout.
Finding themselves in a two-run hole, the Nighthawks immediately responded. With one out, Gavin Brubaker reached on an error and advanced to second on a single from Carter Walsh. Drew Deal walked to load the bases, and then the fun started. Nin Burns II bounced a grounder back to Tampa pitcher Skylar Gonzalez, who tried to throw home but couldn't get a grip on the ball and allowed a Brubaker to score on the error. Bryan Rojas followed with a hard ground ball to first, and the attempt at turning a double play was thrown into shallow left field and allowed both Walsh and Deal to score. Before the inning was over, Burns also scored on a Kaleb Karpstein sacrifice fly, putting NNU up 4-2 after an inning with three Tampa errors and just one Nighthawks hit.
Lugo-Canchola worked around a leadoff walk to set down the next three Spartans in the sixth. NNU created more chaos in the bottom of the inning, with Cris Enriquez drawing a leadoff walk, advancing to second on a groundout by Casey Wayne, and coming in to score when Gonzales committed another error as he threw wide of first on a grounder off the bat of Brubaker.
Lugo-Canchola came back out for the seventh and was able to get one out before a walk ended his outing. Jonathan Zayas entered in relief and quickly ended the inning on just three pitches with a flyout and groundout.
In the eighth, Zayas struck out the first two hitters and after a single, got the third out on a popup to second base. The senior went back out for the ninth and got the first out on a swinging strikeout. Tampa hit another homer to cut the lead to 5-3, but Zayas responded with his fourth strikeout and then a weak grounder to second to send the Nighthawks to victory.
Lugo-Canchola was superb on the big stage, allowing just the two runs on only three hits while striking out seven. He improves to an incredible 13-0 on the season and lowers his opposing batting average to a ridiculous .164. Zayas earned his second save of the season, going 2.2 innings and striking out four.
There were only ten total hits in the game, with Tampa at six and NNU at four, and Kaleb Karpstein had two of them along with an RBI.