In defensive battle, Quakers drop the ball

La Salle entered yesterday's game with four home runs in 26 games and a slugging percentage that resembled a batting average.

The Explorers' modus operandi is no secret - grab a few runs here and there, and lock down with pitching and defense.

Thanks in part to Penn's sloppy fielding, the plan worked to perfection. La Salle needed only four hits to score five runs in a two-inning stretch that gave it the lead for good.

"We gave them some runs," coach John Cole admitted. "We gotta do a better job. We can't give runners extra bases, and that's what we did today."

The chief culprit was an unlikely one. Senior catcher Josh Corn had only three errors going into the game, but picked a bad time to get his fourth.

With one run already in, Corn caught La Salle's Davis Hewett between second and third, only to lose him again - Corn threw the ball into the outfield, letting Hewett score.

The captain would atone somewhat, stroking an RBI single to tie the game at 2-2, but would misstep again in the next inning.

Pitcher Bret Wallace got into trouble, having hit one batter and walked another. But with men on first and third, Corn couldn't help Wallace out; one passed ball later, La Salle was ahead 3-2.

The problem plagued Corn all day.

"The first thing you need to do. is get your glove down and then your body follows," he said. "I was going body first and then glove, so a couple of those got by me that shouldn't have."

The Explorers would add a rare two-run homer and get some more insurance from Penn later. Matt Toffaletti's error in the eighth put the leadoff hitter aboard, and he would eventually score after a passed ball.

In a slugfest, like Penn's 15-12 loss to Brown on Monday, those miscues are relative non-factors. But in a 6-3 game like yesterday's, they were huge.

If there's a silver lining for the league's leaders in errors, it's that their potent bats make them more likely to see lots of those high-scoring games than the low-scoring ones.

The Quakers did turn two clean double plays in the first two innings of the game, but Cole knows that his team will have to cut down on the senseless errors to remain in the hunt for the league title.

"We didn't do much right today," he said. "We need to play better, no question about it."

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