Ayesa’s arm lifts Iowa Wesleyan baseball to only weekend win

MT. PLEASANT — The Iowa Wesleyan baseball team was lucky to have Luis Ayesa on the mound Sunday afternoon. The freshman from Venezuela gave up just one earned run on four hits over nearly seven innings in the Tigers’ 3-1 win.

The low-scoring victory was a bright spot on an otherwise dull four-game series. Fontbonne swept Saturday’s games 16-6 and 4-3, and dominated the finale on Sunday evening, 20-0.

After a disaster opener on Saturday, the Tigers had an early 3-0 lead in Game 2, scoring all runs in the bottom of the first. Fontbonne, however, responded with four in the second and held on for the rest of the game. Lexi Avery was 3-for-4 with an RBI in that loss.

The Tigers scored three times in Sunday afternoon’s 3-1 win. Iowa Wesleyan plated one in the second and one in the third before Fontbonne cut the lead to 2-1 in the fourth. Wesleyan added one insurance run in the sixth.

Corbin Broeker, Jack De Burgh and Minami Matsumoto each contributed to the win. All three players had one RBI in Game 3.

Fontbonne led by just two runs after four innings in the finale. The Griffins, however, poured it on late, scoring three in the fifth, nine in the sixth and six in the seventh.

Iowa Wesleyan (6-15) will host Eureka College in a doubleheader on Tuesday.