MASON, Ohio- The 2019 Lake Erie College baseball season ended today with their 6-4 loss against Ohio Dominican University Panthers today. 

The game was scoreless until the halfway point when Ohio Dominican scored three runs in the bottom half of the fourth.

In the top of the sixth, Anthony Jackson and Sam Browning drew back-to-back walks to start things off. Nathan Birtley singled up the middle to score Jackson, and the Storm scored their first run of the game before Trace Peterson hit a two-RBI double to tie the game up 3-3. 

The Panthers took back the lead in the bottom half of the sixth and scored two more to secure the win and move on to the semifinal matchup of the conference tournament.

The 2019 Storm baseball squad finished their season with a 29-21 record, their best since 2014, and a G-MAC record of 19-11. In 50 games the offense scored 301 runs, with a batting average of .289, an on-base percentage of .374, and a slugging percentage of .440. 

The pitching staff was dominant on the mound in 2019, earning 439 strikeouts, setting a new record for the program and the G-MAC, and allowing only 263 walks. The staff recorded a strikeout per nine innings average of 9.61 and an earned run average of 6.26.

A slew of Storm players broke school records in 2019 as well. Senior David Lemasters, who earned first-team All-GMAC honors, set a new career strikeouts record (269). Additionally, the school record set by Brad Raley for strikeouts in one game was tied by senior Evan Layne, who earned G-MAC Honorable Mention, and Lemasters.

On the offensive side of the ball, two players had historic seasons as well. Senior Nigel Williams, second-team All-GMAC honoree, became the career hits leader in program history with 194, and sophomore Trace Peterson, who also received second-team all G-MAC, broke Storm alumni Luke Raley's single-season home run record with 13.

The core of senior players will surely be missed in 2020, but rising seniors Caleb Waller, Ryan Middendorf, Nathan Erzen, Corbin Paxton, Sam Browning, and Christopher Mutter, along with rising juniors Nathan Birtley and Peterson, and rising sophomore Cade Wendel mark the future for the Storm.

#RageOn