SHIPPENSBURG, Pa. – The Shippensburg University baseball team completed a three-game series sweep over Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) East foe Bloomsburg by taking both games of a doubleheader Saturday at Fairchild Field, 5-2 and 7-4.
 
Shippensburg (16-8, 4-2 PSAC East) rallied for five runs from the fifth inning on in support of graduate Noah Nabholz, who fired a complete game victory in Game 1, 5-2. Three Raider relievers, redshirt-freshman Eric Bohenek, junior Jackson LoBianco and junior Austen Labarre combined for zero earned runs over 7.1 frames in the Game 2 win, 7-4.
 
Bloomsburg (6-9, 2-4) registered just four hits against Nabholz in Game 1. The Huskies out-hit the Raiders 13-to-7 in the nightcap but left a total of 12 runners stranded.
 
Redshirt-sophomore Brock Piper keyed the Game 1 comeback with a game-tying two-run blast in the fifth, and the Raiders rallied for three more an inning later.
 
Graduate Justin Byler, coming off a three-homer performance the day before, kept up his red-hot stretch, going deep again to give the Raiders an early lead in Game 2. He finished the doubleheader with three hits.
 
Freshman Mike Heckman hit .571 in the doubleheader, collecting four knocks.
 
The Raiders are back at Fairchild Field Tuesday to take on the Seton Hill Griffins. First pitch is set for 3 p.m.
 
Game 1: Shippensburg 5, Bloomsburg 2
 
An early pitchers' duel between Nabholz and Bloomsburg starter Jared Marshman saw the visitors strike first, taking a 2-0 lead on a two-run double by Anthony Viggiano in the top half of the fourth.
 
That was all the Huskies could muster against Nabholz, who struck out six and walked just two over seven frames.
 
Piper stepped to the plate with a man on and slugged his first collegiate home run to tie the score in the home half of the fifth.
 
Sophomore Jaxon Dalena laced a two-run triple an inning later to give the Raiders the lead, and freshman Mike Heckman followed with an RBI double to wrap up the scoring.
 
Dalena (2-for-3, 2 R, 2 RBI), Byler (2-for-3) and Heckman (2-for-3) tallied multi-hit efforts in the win.
 
Game 2: Shippensburg 7, Bloomsburg 4
 
Byler smashed his fourth home run of the series, a solo shot, to give SU starter junior Gabe Stotler an early edge in Game 2, 1-0.
 
Bloomsburg answered with a second-inning run off Stotler, who was forced to exit the game after just 1.2 innings.
 
Bohenek did the heavy lifting on the mound in relief, scattering six hits and two unearned runs in 4.1 innings of work. He finished with five strikeouts and zero walks.
 
Chronister connected on a second-inning sacrifice fly to put the Raiders back in front, and Heckman busted it out of the box to force a two-run error in the third to stretch the lead to three, 4-1.
 
The Huskies got a pair of unearned runs back against Bohenek in the sixth, but the righthander was able to strand the bases loaded to maintain a one-run cushion.
 
A Barbera RBI single provided the Raiders with an important insurance run in the seventh, as the Huskies tacked on another unearned run in their next turn.
 
A Piper sacrifice fly and a wild pitch pushed two more across for LaBarre, who set down the Huskies in order in the ninth to record his fifth save.
 
Heckman led the Raiders in Game 2 with two hits and two runs scored.
 
Brandon Ernst recorded three hits and two runs scored for the Huskies.