tl19910509_000 "Vol. 87 No. 14 Maryland's largest student weekly May 9, 1991 Published by the students of Towson State University, Towson The 1101/11erli MD 21204 Season of champions Baseball captures 2nd ECC title in four years, advances to the NCAA's Mark Hoeflich Staff Reporter The 3rd-seeded Tigers took their second ECC tournament in four years with a 5-4 win over Rider last weekend in New Jer-sey, earning a right to play in the NCAA regional tournament which begins May 22. And they won in fine fashion, winning the title as it should be won, on the final play of the game. That final play came on Sun-day against Rider College in the championship game. Rider, down 5-4 in the ninth, had run-ners at the corners with two outs. Joe Gmitter was the run-ner at first after he singled and attempted to steal second. Bruce Rupp, the Tiger catcher, hurried a throw to second only to have it glance off the glove of shortstop Jeff Banks. But second baseman Jacen Martinez was backing up the play and fired a throw to Rupp as Rider's Chris Hart, the run-ner on third, headed home. Rupp made the tag as he and Hart collided but held onto the ball for the final out and the Tigers erupted onto the field. ""I guess its most exciting be-cause probably this would be considered an upset,"" said head coach Mike Gottlieb. ""Rider was the number one seed. They had an outstanding record and they certainly had an awful lot more experience than we did."" The win was a total team ef-fort. But Larry Raynor, who was selected as the Most Valuable Player of the tournament, stood out the most recording two wins. With the Tigers being the third seed and knocking off the num-ber one seed, some might say that it may have played over its head. Coach Gottlieb thinks dif-ferently. ""We didn't play over our heads we just played as well as we could when it counted."" The Tigers played like it was all business, or was it just a con-tinuation of a fine-tuned last third of the season in which it went 10-3, winning seven of eight ECC games. The Tigers manhandled their way through the first two rounds, igniting a relentless of-fense that scattered 32 hits and scored 39 runs. They hit nine home runs while batting .413 as a team. see COVER STORY, page 9 Wendy Kohlus/The Towerlight top right: Bullpen ace Brad Stinar led the ECC with 6 saves in the regular season; above: Senior defenseman Courtney Page tries to break through a wall of UMBC players. Dan Richter/ The Towerlight Women's lacrosse repeats as ECC champion David Wharen Staff Reporter Because of pressure and expec-tations, the toughest task for de-fending champions to accom-plish is repeating. A five-goal barrage in the sec-ond half led Tbwson State over Delaware, 11-6 for their second consecutive East Coast Confer-ence title Sunday, at Towson Center Field. TSU, the top-seeded team in the tournament, faced UMBC on May 4 in the semi-final. The Re-trievers planned to slow down the Tiger onslaught, but still came up on the short end, 8-5. The win placed the Tigers into the championship game for the second straight year to face their old nemesis, Delaware. The Blue Hens vaulted into the champi-onship by clubbing Drexel, 14-6. ""1 knew that if we played like we did earlier in the season (13- 5 victory) that we would win,"" said Tiger coach Alison Williams. ""Playing aggressively and not (playing) nervous would allow us to win."" The weather for the champion-ship game was Superb, as was the action in the first half There were five ties and five lead changes in the half. The first lead was claimed by Tbwson at 22:17 as freshman at-tacker Becky Patton ripped the net with the assist from senior attacker Kelle Price. see COVER STORY, page 8 nside: tu en c argee wit men en s lacrosse loses to to murder in Sunday Hopkins, falls to tenth in morning assault, p. 2. USILA poll, p. 10. woomroomtamorlmat..111111111, ANIIIIIIMIN.10�1�MM11111?11161....� *Memories from a graduating student, p. 20. dial* "
