At the bottom of the seventh, moments after Harvard relievers had given up three consecutive home runs for the Crimson, Carter came to bat with Mager on first and two outs. Carter knocked a Dan Fitzgerald pitch into left field that seemed certain to go for extra bases—easily far enough to score the speedy Mager from first.

The ball bounced when it hit the grass in left. And then it bounced again—over the wall for a ground-rule double. Mager, already practically home, was stranded on third as the Crimson had second and third with two outs.

The next batter, Hendricks, struck out looking on three pitches to end the inning. It was Hendricks’ third called strikeout of the day.

“When does a ball two-hop the fence?” Walsh said. “One-hop, yeah. Never two-hop. You might see me out here one night putting some eight foot fences out there, one to keep the other team’s balls in the yard, and also to keep ours in.”

Harvard and Penn each scored in the eighth to extend the ball game even further, but Penn pounced on Harvard’s bullpen in the top of the ninth. Blagojevich homered to dead center off Wahlberg (1-3) to give Penn the lead. Wahlberg then walked outfielder Nate Moffie, who advanced to third when the pinch hitter, Matt Horn, hit a double into the gap. An intentional walk loaded the bases.

At this point, Satyanaryana relieved Wahlberg to face the three batters who had homered in the seventh. Saty battled DH Jim Mullen to a full count, only four ball four to go just outside the strike zone to force in a run. Then, Italiano got all of a 2-1 pitch for his second homer of the game, a grand slam that put the game out of reach. Penn finished the inning with eight runs before T.J. Sevier finally stopped the bleeding.

“I gotta hand it to Penn,” Mager said. “A six-run lead is a big lead. No matter what happens with our pitching and the wind, six runs is a lot to come back from. Pitching has carried us this year, I don’t think we can fault them for one inning.”

Penn’s seventh inning began with junior Kenon Ronz on the mound in the seventh. Glass bunted his way aboard to begin the inning, and Mullen drilled a 3-1 pitch to left field to cut a 10-4 deficit to 10-6. In the next at bat, Italiano took Ronz deep to right field and out of the game, as the junior was pulled in favor of Dryden.

Dryden’s return after a year away from O’Donnell Field was not a happy one, as he allowed a third homer—this time to McCreery. Two batters later, Wahlberg relieved Dryden, and Moffie’s two-run homer completed the improbable comeback.

“Even though the wind was blowing out, every ball that was hit out there except for the one off Dryden was crushed,” Walsh said. “So I give Penn some credit, they kicked our butts. They’ve got a good swinging ball club.”

Despite a rocky outing by Crimson senior Justin Nyweide, Harvard had built what seemed to be a solid lead thanks largely to Penn errors. The Crimson bounced back from an early 4-2 deficit in the third on errors by Italiano and Penn catcher Billy Collins and a wild pitch by starter Mike Mattern.

Mager went 4-for-5 in the first game and knocked in four runs. With his team-leading 29 hits on the year, Mager is 19 hits away from Harvard’s career hit mark of 208, set by Hal Carey ’99.

Harvard 10, Columbia 6