ST. PAUL, Minn. – The Macalester College baseball team faced 18th-ranked Gustavus Adolphus in a MIAC doubleheader on Friday at Nicholson Field in the final games of the season. The Scots fought hard and mounted an improbable comeback in the second game but fell, 8-2 and 12-7 to drop to 12-23 overall and 5-15 in the conference. The Gusties (33-7) clinched a share of the MIAC regular-season title with a 17-3 MIAC record.

In the first game, Macalester answered a run by Gustavus in the top of the third inning with a run in the bottom of the third. Sophomore Holden Peacock (Houston, Texas/Kinkaid School) led off with a bunt single, stole second and advanced to third on a wild pitch. First year Aram Dombalagian (Glenville, Ill./North Shore Country Day) followed with a single to plate Peacock with the tying run.  The game remained tied until the top of the fifth, when the Gusties put four runs on the board for a 5-1 lead. Gustavus added three more runs in the top of the seventh to lead, 8-1. In the bottom of the seventh, first year Tristan Lander (West Chester, Pa./B. Reed Henderson) hit a pinch-hit single to bring home junior Niko Alexander (Bethesda, Md./Walt Whitman) for the final run of the game. Dombalagian went 3-for-3, while Peacock had two hits.

Momentum stayed with the visitors in the second game, as the Gusties scored five runs in the top of the first inning. Gustavus added another run in the top of the fourth inning while holding Macalester without a hit through five innings. In the bottom of the sixth, junior Nathan Gumagay (Potomac, Md./Winston Churchill) led off with a single. After junior Raymond McCaskey (Colorado Springs, Colo./Manitou Springs) was hit by a pitch, Peacock roped a single into left to plate Gumagay for the Scots' first run. Still in the sixth, junior Stephen Paulsen (Middleton, Wis./Middleton) bunted McCaskey and Peacock to second and third for Dombalagian, who singled through the left side to bring home McCaskey. Junior Josh Planko (Northville, Mich./Northville) followed with a grounder that allowed Peacock to score and moved Dombalagian to third. After a pitching change and a walk by sophomore Braden LaChapelle (Bethesda, Md./Walter Johnson), junior Tristan Jones (Fairfield, Conn./Greens Farms Academy) hit a double off the right-field wall to bring home Dombalagian and LaChapelle and make the score 6-5.

After Gustavus pushed a run across in the top of the seventh, McCaskey doubled and scored on a single by Paulsen to make the score 7-6 Gusties after seven innings. In the bottom of the eighth, Gumagay hit an RBI double to plate junior Brennan Murley (Bethesda, Md./Walt Whitman) with the tying run. The comeback was thwarted late, as Gustavus regained the lead with five runs on six hits in the top of the ninth to put the game out of reach, 12-7.

Peacock and Gumagay each had two hits for the Scots. Senior pitcher Shun Mizuno (Irving, Texas/Ranchview) pitched three scoreless innings, and senior Izzy Flood (Evanston, Ill./Evanston) allowed a run over three innings of relief in their final game as a Scot.

Between games, Macalester recognized seniors Flood, Mizuno, Ben Levinson (Piedmont, Calif./Piedmont), Jake Murakami (Chappaqua, N.Y./Horace Greeley), Jacob Posner (Los Angeles, Calif./Alexander Hamilton), Ryan Przespolewski (Spring, Texas/Oak Ridge) and Cam Scholl (Belmont, Calif./Carlmont) as a part of Senior Day.