NAMPA, ID –The Central Washington University baseball team (16-29-1, 13-25) split day one of the two day series against Northwest Nazarene University (22-22, 18-17) in their final Great Northwest Athletic Conference matchup of the year. The Wildcats took game two of the day after dropping the first game.
 
Joshua Touhey got the nod for game one of the series and gave a strong outing for his first start of his college career. The freshman went four innings and gave up just one run on three hits while striking out four and not walking a single batter. The Wildcat offense struggled to string much together until the fifth inning.
 
Justin Hampson led off the inning with a single to left field and then Jaden Hassell followed with a double down the left field line moving Hampson to third base. Yi-fan Pan then flied out to right field which brought in Hampson from third to tie the game at one. 
 
Although the Wildcats outhit the Nighthawks, NNU was able to put four runs on the board (one off Touhey and three off AJ Wood). Hampson led the team with three hits in the game and Hassell had two of his own.
 
The Wildcats offense really exploded behind a dominate outing from Connor Stevenson. Central put up seven runs on 9 hits. The first run came in the first inning when Mitch Lesmeister was able to score on a wild pitch. Then in the second inning, Jason Hill doubled with two outs and then two batters later, Hampson hit a double of his own to bring Hill in from second. 
 
In the fourth inning, Hill doubled again to lead off the inning and later came around to score on a Hampson sacrifice fly. Central added three more runs in the sixth inning to extend their lead to 6-3. Michael Hickey scored from second after he led off the inning with a walk. Both Lesmeister and Hampson also scored in the inning. 
 
Robert Ball singled with two outs in the seventh inning and then scored with after Hill hit his third double of the game. Connor Stevenson was dominate on the mound. The senior went seven innings in what will likely be his last outing in a Wildcat uniform. Stevenson allowed three runs on just three hits. He struck out five batters and walked just two of the 26 batters that he faced. 
 
"Connor was dominate on the mound today," CWU Head Coach Desi Storey said. "He filled up the strike zone and attacked early on in the count. The offense did a great job all day and really gave Connor a cushion to work with all day and the defense was solid all day. Touhey also did a great job in game one. He pitched well enough all year and earned the start today and didn't disappoint." 
 
The Wildcats will finish out their regular season tomorrow with the final two games of the season at 3:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m.