Rowland’s Blast, Pitching Staff Outpowers Penn On Saturday Afternoon

Saturday, February 28

Macon, Ga.

2 p.m.

Mercer University

10-1

Penn

0-5

Penn

Mercer

Rowland’s Blast, Pitching Staff Outpowers Penn On Saturday Afternoon

2/28/2026 5:55:00 PM | Baseball

Box Score

By: Rylee Bamberger, Rylee.m.bamberger@live.mercer.edu

MACON – A dominant performance by Mercer's pitching staff and a big-time blast by Nathan Rowland pushed the Bears (10-1) past Penn (0-5) in a 5-3 win on Saturday afternoon at OrthoGeorgia Park.

Decisive Plays:

The Quakers opened the scoring with a two-run home run by Qwynn Ahearn in the top of the fourth inning. Rowland responded with a two-run blast of his own, his first at the collegiate level, to make it a brand-new ball game. The Bears loaded the bases in the bottom half of the fifth and jumped into the lead courtesy of a sacrifice fly by Titan Kamaka. With two outs and two runners out, Kaleb Huffman roped a single into left field which cleared the bases and gave Mercer a 5-2 advantage. An RBI single would cut the Quakers' deficit to two runs in the sixth inning however, the tandem of Ismael Borrero, Andrew Garnett and Collin Ewaldsen combined for 3.1 innings of shutout baseball with Ewaldsen earning his first save of the season.

Key Contributors:

Nathan Rowland: 2-for-4, HR, 2 RBI, R
Kaleb Huffman: 2-for-3, 2 RBI
Miguel Hugas: 5.2 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 4 SO, 98 NP, W
Ismael Borrero: 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 2 SO
Andrew Garnett: 1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, SO
Collin Ewaldsen: 1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0, ER, 0 BB, 2 SO, SV

Noteworthy:

Nathan Rowland picked up his first home run at the collegiate level. Rowland's fourth-inning blast is Mercer's 16th homer of the season, the most in the Southern Conference.
Miguel Hugas threw the most pitches by a Bear since Colton Cosper's 140-pitch complete game win in the SoCon tournament last season. Hugas picked up his third win at the Division I level after throwing 98 pitches across 5.2 innings and limited the Quakers to just three runs.
Kaleb Huffman continues to thrive at the plate since re-entering the starting lineup. Over his last five games, the senior outfielder is 5-for-9 (.556) 5 RBI, 4 R, 2 XBH and three walks.

Next Game:

The Bears conclude their weekend series with Penn on Sunday, March 1. First pitch is scheduled for 1:00 p.m. Pitching matchups are TBD. Live stats will be available at mercerbears.com. Tickets are available at http://mercerbears.com/tickets.