PARKLAND - In games that were about as opposite from each other as one could imagine, Pacific Lutheran maintained its one-game Northwest Conference baseball lead by sweeping a doubleheader from visiting Lewis & Clark on a blustery and sometimes rainy Saturday afternoon.

The Lutes won the opener in convincing fashion, 23-2, then had to hold off a fiesty Pioneers team to win the second game, 4-3, in 11 innings. With the wins, the 16th-ranked Lutes improve their overall record to 29-7 and their conference mark to 17-3. They are one game ahead of 16-4 Linfield, which swept a doubleheader at George Fox on Saturday. Both teams complete their three-game series against their current opponents starting at noon on Sunday.

The first game was never close after the Lutes scored five times in the first inning, with four of the runs coming after there were two outs. The Pioneers (9-23, 6-17) got a run back in the third inning, but Pacific Lutheran proceeded to score 18 runs over the next six innings, including three runs each from the fourth through seventh frames.

The Lutes finished the game with 17 hits and benefitted from three Pioneers pitchers who walked 13 batters and hit another. Brock Gates was 3-for-3 in the game with five runs scored and three RBI, two of those coming on a monster shot over the left-centerfield fence in the fourth inning. In addition to Gates' three hits, Sammy Davis, Dan Johansen and Ryan Aratani all had a pair of safeties.

Josh Takayoshi collected four runs batted in, three coming on his sixth homer of the season in the fifth inning. Ben Shively drove in four runs, including a bases-clearing double in the third, and Ethan Ottemiller also drove in three with a double in the first inning. Ryan Boyles, one of seven players to come off the bench and get at least one at bat, slugged a grand slam home run among his five RBI.

Tucker Laurence had two of the Pioneers' seven hits, all coming against Lutes winner Trey Watt. The senior right-hander improved his season record to 9-0, matching teammate Robert Bleecker as the only pitchers in PLU baseball history to start a season with nine straight wins. Watt went six innings, striking out three, before Paul DiPietro threw three hitless innings to earn his first save of the season.

After the first game, there was little reason to believe the the Pioneers would stifle the PLU offense, but that's just what starting pitcher Alex St. Pierre did for 10 innings. He allowed three runs, two earned, on eight hits while walking four and fanning five.

The Lutes got a run in the first on Takayoshi's RBI single, they added a run in the sixth on Ryan Aratani's run-scoring single, and they made it 3-0 in the seventh on Shively's sacrifice fly following the first of Corey Moore's two doubles. Other than that, St. Pierre limited the normally potent PLU offense and kept his team in the game.

Meanwhile, Bleecker was very effective against the Pioneers with seven straight shutout innings until they reached him for two in the eighth and one in the ninth to tie it. In the eighth, Guiseppe Baffaro walked and Michael Ball followed with a single. Both runners moved up a base on a sacrifice, and after a walk to Laurence, pinch hitter Eliot Smith hit a single through the right side of the infield to drive in two runs. The Lutes escaped further damage when the infield turned its fourth double play of the game.

The Pioneers tied it in the ninth when Roland Greene led off with a double, moved up a base on a sacrifice and eventually scored on Baffaro's base hit. Ryan Frost entered the game with two runners on base and escaped further damage by recording the final two outs.

The Lutes had chances to score in both the eighth and ninth but wasted those with double play grounders, and they left the bases loaded in the 10th when third baseman Jim Bray made a fine play on Brock Gates' grounder.

PLU finally broke through against Ball, on in relief of St. Pierre. Moore led off the 11th with a double and scored on Shively's one-out single.

Frost picked up the win in relief to improve to 2-1, allowing just one hit while fanning three in 2 2/3 innings. Bleecker ended up allowing three runs, all earned, in nine hits while walking three and striking out two in 8 1/3 innings. Ball, the losing pitcher, is now 2-2 this season.

- PLU -