Ari Friedman, Special to The Denisonian —

The Denison baseball team played a marathon of a game vs. Arcadia University on March 13 in Port Charlotte, Florida, which didn’t end until the next day due to the weather.

Pitchers, look away. To give you an idea of how crazy this game was, the score was 16-7 at the end of the third inning. When it was all said and done, the Big Red came out on top with a jaw-dropping score of 25-23. In a game that featured 129 plate appearances, 47 hits, 11 home runs, and even a cycle, one can imagine there was some external factor affecting the game. That factor was the 25 MPH winds blowing out to center field.

“Any ball over our heads was probably gonna be a home run”, said first-year outfielder Erik Sundgren ‘26, who reached base 3 times and stole a base.
The wind got so bad that the game was suspended in the middle of the 8th inning and resumed the next day. The score at the time of the delay was Arcadia 23, Denison 23. As the score indicates, the game was filled with offensive highlights. Senior third baseman Ari Fierer ‘23 and junior first baseman Noah Leib ‘24 hit two home runs each, with Fierer recording 7 total RBIs and Leib going a perfect 5 for 5. To top it off, senior catcher Charlie Glennon ‘23 had put up a cycle by the end of the 7th inning.

“He’s an amazing catcher defensively. He’s been swinging really well this year and he was on point that game”, said junior pitcher George Viebrock ‘24. Glennon remained behind the plate for the entire game as well. Other notable stat lines included a 5-6 performance with a home run and three walks from sophomore designated hitter Eric Colaco ‘25, and a near identical performance from junior right fielder Jake Welsch ‘24, who also went 5-6 with a home run.

After an 18-hour overnight delay, Viebrock came in and pitched a dominant scoreless final three innings to seal the game for Big Red.
This included the 10th inning after Denison’s offense grinded out two runs to take the lead in the top half of the extra frame.
“I thought of [the resumption] as a fresh game…the elements were normal and I just had to go out and do my job,” said Viebrock.

Arcadia made him work for the final three outs, as they strung together three hits to load the bases, but Viebrock was able to close the door on a lineout to center field. Despite being down 16-7 in the third inning, Big Red wasn’t intimidated and came back to win one of the craziest games in Denison baseball history and potentially all of college baseball history.

It was even featured on ESPN, as their social media accounts made posts about the unbelievable result.

In the seven non-conference matchups following the contest, Denison went 5-2 and was ranked No. 15 nationally before beginning conference play with a doubleheader sweep over Wabash at home on Sunday, April 2.