Saint John's baseball continues its homestand by hosting Northwestern for a 3 p.m. doubleheader today at Haugen Field at Becker Park. - Live Stats/Live Video

A LOOK AT THE JOHNNIES: Saint John's (7-9 overall) opened its home schedule with a doubleheader sweep of Crown, 3-1 and 6-5, yesterday (March 20) in Collegeville. The Johnnies received a complete-game effort from senior pitcher Nathan Brandecker (South St. Paul, Minn.) in game one and earned the walk-off win in the nightcap thanks to senior right fielder Soren Roe's (Golden Valley, Minn./Blake) leadoff, solo homer in the bottom of the ninth inning.

at Saint John's 3, Crown 1
SJU gained an early 2-0 lead thanks to a pair of unearned runs in the bottom of the first inning. Junior shortstop Matthew Hayford (Rochester, Minn./Lourdes) brought in the first with an RBI single and senior catcher Ethan Roe (Golden Valley, Minn./Blake) made it 2-0 with an RBI groundout.

Sophomore left fielder Jack Schleper (Shakopee, Minn.) padded the Johnnies' lead with an RBI single in the third inning.

Bailey Sarto recorded the lone blemish for Crown (7-6 overall), a two-out homer in the top of the fifth inning.

Brandecker allowed seven hits, six singles, to improve to 3-0 on the season. He struck out six and did not issue a free pass.

at Saint John's 6, Crown 5
The Storm found the scoreboard first with an unearned run, via passed ball, in the top of the first inning. The Johnnies answered with a sacrifice fly from Soren Roe in the bottom half of the first and plated two unearned runs on a seeing-eye single from sophomore third baseman Joe Becker (New Prague, Minn.) with two outs in the second.

Schleper hammered a 1-0 pitch over the right-field fence for his second homer of the season and fifth of his career to lead off the fourth inning and give SJU a 4-1 lead.

Crown cut its deficit to 4-2 with an unearned run on a wild pitch in the fifth inning, though SJU took advantage of a bases-loaded wild pitch in the sixth.

The Storm sent five men to the plate and scored three runs before an out was recorded to tie the game at 5-5 in the seventh inning. That is, until sophomore Griffin Larson (Edina, Minn.) came on in relief and slammed the door shut. With runners on the corners and nobody out, Larson struck out the first two batters he faced and induced a fly ball to right. That pace continued in the next two innings, as Larson set down the Storm in order and totaled five more strikeouts to earn his first collegiate win.

Soren Roe launched a 3-1 pitch over the left-field fence for the walk-off homer, his second long ball of the season and sixth as a Johnnie. He has now reached base safely in all 16 of SJU's games so far in 2022.

Sophomore Kody Dalen (Carver, Minn./Chanhassen) allowed two unearned runs on eight hits in the no-decision. He struck out four and walked two in 5.2 innings.

Larson's clean stat sheet included seven strikeouts in three hitless and scoreless innings.

Sophomore center fielder Jordan Amundson (Eden Prairie, Minn.) led SJU with a 4-for-6 performance on the day.

The Johnnies batted only 5-for-29 (.172) with runners on base in the twinbill, though Crown went just 2-for-16 (.125) with runners in scoring position. Both teams left 10 men on base in game two and 31 total (17 for SJU, 14 for Crown).

WALK-OFF WINNER: Roe's walk-off homer was SJU's first in Collegeville since Max Jackson '19 broke a scoreless tie with a one-out, three-run shot in the bottom of the ninth inning against St. Olaf on May 5, 2018. The leadoff game-winner was the program's first since Matt Boys' '11 solo shot against Springfield (Mass.) in the bottom of the 14th inning on March 19, 2011, in Chandler, Ariz. The final score? 6-5.

SOPHOMORE STRIKEOUT SPECIALIST: Larson now has 18 strikeouts, to no walks, over his last 7.1 innings pitched (of the 22 outs he has recorded on the mound, only four were not strikeouts).

A LOOK AT THE EAGLES: Northwestern (4-3 overall) recently played on Saturday (March 19) and split a doubleheader at Nebraska Wesleyan. Junior Owen Boerema struck out 13 over eight shutout innings but did not record the decision as NWU walked it off with a two-out, RBI single in the bottom of the ninth. The Eagles bounced back with 12 hits and scored five unearned runs in a 12-9 win in game two. Junior Bryce Crabb improved to 3-0 with the victory after he allowed four runs on six hits in eight innings. He struck out seven. The Prairie Wolves made the game closer with five unearned runs, including a grand slam, in the ninth inning. Crabb is 3-0 with a 2.05 ERA, .171 opponent batting average and 20 strikeouts in 22 innings. At the plate, he leads the Eagles in batting average (.440), hits (11) and stolen bases (2). 

SERIES HISTORY: Today's games are the first meetings between SJU and Northwestern on the baseball diamond.