SALEM, Ore.  – Taylor Hunter lined his first home run of the season over the left-field fence leading off the bottom of the 11th inning, giving the George Fox University Bruins a dramatic 5-4 win over the Willamette University Bearcats in the second of a three-game Northwest Conference baseball series Sunday afternoon here at John Lewis Field.

A doubleheader had been planned for the day at the Bruins' Morse Field in Newberg, but overnight rains only made a bad situation in the outfield worse, so the games were moved to Willamette's home diamond, with the Bruins as the home team.  However, the length of the first game - 3:57 after a 1:00 p.m. start - prompted the coaches to move the third and final game to Monday at 2:00 p.m. at John Lewis Field again.

The game that was played was a bizarre mishmash with plenty of hits but a dearth of runs (Willamette had 17 hits but could produce only four runs, while George Fox had five runs on 11 hits), runners left all over the place (26 in all), base-running blunders galore, struggling starters, good relief efforts, and three errors by the normally sure-handed Bruin defense that cost a run and sent the game into extra innings.

Each team had two hits in both the first and second innings but could not score, Bruin center fielder Nate Hickok throwing out Bearcats trying to score from second at the plate in both innings.  George Fox finally broke through in the third against Blake Paisley, who allowed six hits in his three innings of work.  Hunter was hit by a pitch to start the rally, was sacrificed to second, and scored on Eric Gantenbein's double to center.  Derek Aldrich singled to put runners at the corners, and Derek Blankenship beat the relay throw to first on a potential inning-ending double play grounder to short as Gantenbein scored.

George Fox starter Clay Gartner was unscored on through five innings, though he allowed seven hits and walked three.  He helped himself by picking off one runner in third, and another Willamette runner was erased in the fourth when catcher Gantenbein caught him too far off second and threw down, trapping the runner in a rundown.

T.C. Lee started the Willamette sixth with a walk, bringing on Kyle Albertson to replace Gartner.  Max Stepan singled and Michael Oliver beat out a sacrifice bunt attempt to load the bases.  With one out, Tim Schilf lined a shot off the fence in right-center as Lee scored, but Stepan held up in case the ball was caught and only made it to third.   Oliver, free-wheeling it around second, was forced to return to the middle bag while Schilf, thinking double all the way, found himself trapped between first and second and was eventually tagged out to thwart the rally.

The Bruins added two unearned runs in the sixth.  Zac Israel led off with a single and went to third when Todd Nagamine's sacrifice was thrown away by reliever Ryan Smith.  Hickok was hit by a pitch to load the bases before Dan Winterstein flied out to center to score Israel.  Nagamine was picked off second, but Hunter delivered Hickok all the way from first with a double to right-center.

The Bearcats picked up a run in the seventh as Tyson Giza walked and scored on a double by Doug Bloom, and one in the eighth on singles by Brandon Chinn, Adam Reid, and Giza.  In the ninth, Bloom singled off Bruin closer Jacob Brown (1-0), went to second on a wild pickoff throw, and scored to tie it 4-4 when Gantenbein hit Lee with his throw to first on a sacrifice bunt.   

Brown eventually got the win with three innings of four-hit relief, allowing only the one unearned run and striking out five with no walks.  Willamette relievers Smith, Andrew Wyman, and Kyle Kirwan (0-1) allowed the Bruins only one hit from the seventh through the 10th innings before Hunter laced a 3-1 low inside fastball over a leaping Lee in left for the game-winner.

Hunter and Israel each went 3-for-5 for the Bruins, Hunter with two doubles, a homer, two runs scored and two RBIs.  Winterstein and Aldrich had two hits each.

For the Bearcats, Galen Duff, Bloom, and Reid also went 3-for-5, Duff falling a home run short of the cycle but without a run scored or one driven in.  Giza and Schilf also had two hits apiece.

George Fox, ranked 22nd nationally by D3baseball.com, improved to 13-5 overall and 2-2 in the conference.  Willamette, dropping its fifth in a row, slipped to 8-8 overall and 3-5 in the NWC.