By Broderick Frye
Asst. Sports Information Director
Warhawks score 12 runs between 7th & 8th innings to propel them into the Championship
The University of Wisconsin-Whitewater baseball team booked their second consecutive trip the NCAA Division III World Series Final with a dominant 17-4 win over Rowan University. The Warhawks finished the game out strong, scoring 12 runs in their final two innings of offense.
Max Huseboe (Ripon, Wis./Ripon) got the call on the mound and delivered to a 1-2-3 inning to get the game underway. The Warhawk offense got to work right away with a sacrifice fly to grab the first run.
Rowan answered back quickly, scoring two runs in the second to take the lead. The Profs worked on keeping the potent Warhawk offense quiet, tossing two scoreless innings to retain the lead.
Sam Paden (Libertyville, Ill./Libertyville) hit a hard ball to cause an error and a score to tie the game up in the fourth, but Rowan retook the lead on a sacrifice bunt.
The Warhawk offense hit full stride in the fifth, putting their first crooked number on the board with a 3-run frame. A two-run double from Adam Cootway (DePere, Wis./Fox Valley Lutheran) followed by a Paden RBI single put the Warhawks up for good at 5-3.
Rowan closed the gap to just one run with a sacrifice fly in the sixth, but the one run lead didn’t last long for the Warhawks.
Eli Frank (Bayport, Wis./Bay Port) kickstarted another rally, with the Warhawks loading up the bases with one out. Two runs scored on a back-to-back passed ball and wild pitch.
Aaron Holland (Wheaton, Ill./Wheaton North) cleaned off another two runs to put the Warhawks up 9-4 heading into the last two innings.
After a lead-off walk, Ethan Wickman (Spring Green, Wis./River Valley) put the Rowan batters down in order to put the Warhawks three outs away from their second consecutive Finals appearance.
In the 8th, the Warhawks broke the game wide open with an 8-run frame to put the game away.
Sam Paden (Libertyville, Ill./Libertyville) highlighted the inning with a three-run homer, a sense of deja vu for the right fielder. A year ago today, Paden hit the walk-off home run against Birmingham Southern in the World Series.
A heads-up play by Darryl Jackson (Milwaukee, Wis./Rufus King) and Dominik McVay (Mineral Point, Wis./Mineral Point) made the most of a wild pitch. Holland, Scolan, and Cootway went back-to-back-to-back RBI hits to cap off the huge inning.
A two-out single would be the only base-runner for the Profs in the Top of the 9th. Brady Malkow (Brodhead, Wis./Brodhead) recorded the last strikeout needed, sending the Warhawks back to the NCAA Division III Championship Series.
The Warhawks will take on Messiah in the final best-of-three series. The first game has been moved up a day due to the forecasted weather. Game one will take place on Tuesday, June 3rd at 2 pm CDT. The second and third games will be on Wednesday, June 4th beginning at 10 am CDT. [The championship is best of three games, so the third game may not be necessary.]
There will be a link to Tuesday’s game here.
Editor’s notes: Messiah’s season record is 39-14. They were the only team that entered the series unranked, and they were considered #8 in Eastlake. In the DIII “World Series” they won the right to play #3 UW-W by beating Johns Hopkins (#1) 16-7, Endicott (#4) 9-5 and Endicott a second time by 8-2. Messiah is located in Mechanicsburg, PA and it has an undergraduate/graduate enrollment of 3320 students. A win for them would be the second consecutive PA team win, as Misericordia beat UW-W for the championship last year. Per d3baseball.com, “Head coach Phill Shallenberger is in his fourth year and will be the least experienced coach in Eastlake. Every other head coach has been with their team a minimum of ten years. Messiah is a top 50 team in slugging (32nd) and ERA (31st). Among all the teams in the Series, they steal bases at a rate to make them third in the nation.” This is Messiah’s first appearance in the DIII “World Series.”
UW-W’s season record is 46-6. They won the right to compete versus #8 Messiah by beating Trinity (TX) (#6) 7-3, Denison (#2) 11-4, and Rowan, (#7) 17-5. Per d3baseball.com, “The Warhawks are the most experienced team this weekend as they make their ninth appearance in program history. Last year, they finished second to Misericordia but is back in 2025 to try to win their third national championship. UW-Whitewater coach John Vodenlich leads the rest of the head coaches combined in the series in championships (2-0) and World Series wins (19). The Warhawks took Player of the Year (Matt Scolan) and Pitcher of the Year (Max Husebee) honors. Ten players in total were placed 2025 All-WIAC baseball teams. Nobody has a better batting average than UWW in D-III baseball and only Johns Hopkins has a higher slugging percentage. With a 11th best ERA and 8th best WHIP, the pitching staff is almost as good as the offense.”
