Thanks to the arm of Marcus Limon and the bat of Keith Martin, the Pioneers have a chance at their first trip to Lewiston, Idaho. Limon had 14 strikeouts and limited top-ranked Lubbock Christian to just two runs and Martin went 3-for-4 with four RBI to lead Wayland to a 6-2 victory over LCU on Thursday evening at Hays Field.
The two teams meet again on Friday at 1 pm to see who gets to advance to the NAIA World Series next week.
The NAIA's strikeout leader, Limon's 14 K's against the Chaps tied a school record. The sophomore had not started a game for the Pioneers since April 3 due to a sore elbow. He saw only limited duty in relief during the final few weeks of the regular season, but did not make an appearance at all in the final series with Lubbock Christian.
LCU, the visiting team on the scoreboard, plated the first run of the game in the top of the first when Jaime Armendariz led off with a single, advanced to second on a balk, and scored on Ross Blondin's single through the right side.
Wayland put up two in its half of the inning on three straight base hits from Brett Cook, Eddie Allen and Keith Martin, and then a one-out double to right by Pedro Gomez.
Neither team produced a run in the second, but Gomez knocked home Allen in the third to make it a 3-1 ballgame.
A Pioneer error put a runner on board to lead off the fourth, but after Limon enduced a pop foul and a strikeout, freshman catcher Oscar Rivera threw out the attempted base stealer for the third out.
The big inning for WBU came in the fifth when back-to-back singles by Cook and Allen was followed by a massive home run off the bat of Martin that made it 6-1. It was the senior DH's 14th long ball of the season.
Limon got in his biggest jam of the night in the top of the sixth. Four straight singles to start the frame scored one run and the Chaps still had the bases loaded with no outs. LCU first baseman Rob Learned hit the first pitch he saw to Michael Prell at third who stepped on the bag for the force, then gunned the ball home for a double play.
After Allen made a great play deep in the hole to prevent another run from scoring, Limon struck out designated hitter Dan Neumann to end the inning.
Two more LCU batters made it to the base paths in the seventh on a two-out single by Armendariz and a walk to Tanner Rindels, but Limon got Will Stramp, the nation's leading hitter, to strikeout swinging.
Back for more work in the eighth, Limon gave up another two-out single, but again got a strikeout swinging for the third out of the inning. In the ninth, he simply sat the Chaps down in order, getting the game's final out on a ground ball to short.
The Pioneers got their six runs on ten hits. Cook, Allen and Gomez had two hits each.
Lubbock Christian had nine hits off Limon, but none went for extra bases. LCU went into the game as the NAIA leader in doubles, and was second in triples and home runs.
Wayland improves to 43-14 on the season, tying the school record for most wins in a season. LCU is now 46-7.
