JOLIET, Ill. -- For 6 1/3 innings in the NAIA Baseball Tournament Opening Round championship, Campbellsville University sophomore pitcher Rusty Devitt was perfect against Cumberland University. Unfortunately for the Tigers, Devitt's 12-strikeout, three-hit performance was outmatched by Cumberland University's Aaron Wilkerson, who fanned a 2010 Tournament record 17 batters in a 3-0 Tiger loss.

With the win, Cumberland (53-9) advances to the Avista-NAIA World Series for the 11th time in program history, and the first time since 2007, while Campbellsville falls just shy of its second trip and finishes the year 42-22.

"He (Willkerson) was that much better than us. Hitting has been our undoing too much this year, but he's a quality pitcher and just dominated us," CU head coach Beauford Sanders said.

Devitt gave the Tigers a chance on the wet Silver Cross Field, an environment that he said pregame  made him feel like he was back home in Silverdale, Wash.

With the game scoreless as it approached the seventh inning, the Cumberland radio crew was wowed by Devitt's performance and attempted to jinx the perfect game by announcing the attempt on air as they came back from commercial break. It worked.

Despite falling behind 3-0 to his first batter, Devitt recorded his 11^th strikeout of the game, but Sam Kikla shattered the attempt with a double to deep center for the Bulldogs' first base runner. Matt Greener, who had been hitless in the tournament, followed with a double to left-center to give Cumberland a 1-0 lead. Devitt responded with his 12^th strikeout of the game as the Tiger bullpen got active, but Troy Frazier singled in pinch runner Adam Sprague for a 2-0 lead.

After retiring the third out with a fly ball to right, Devitt exited the game with a seven-inning, three-hit performance. He allowed two earned runs and struck out a career-high 12 hitters. At that point in the game, both starting pitchers combined for 24 strikeouts.

"Boy, he met the challenge," Sanders said. "He's grown strides this year, particularly mentally. He's turned out to be quite a guy on the hill."

Both pitchers were flawless early, until Michael Caleb recorded the Tigers' first hit with a one-out single into shallow right field in the fourth. There were only five Tiger runners in the game, as Richie Rowland and Luke Gadow led off the fifth and sixth innings, respectively with a walk. The sixth was the Tigers' one shot at a threat, as Alex Ponich fouled off both bunt attempts, but singled to put two on with no outs. Gadow was thrown out at third though when he tried to steal with a ball he thought got lost in the dirt and Caleb grounded into a double play at short to end the inning.

"We had a glimmer of hope in the sixth, but if, if, if …" Sanders said. "If we score there, then we might be looking for a place to play game two right now."

Spencer Frantz took over in the eighth and allowed two base runners but escaped the jam when Greg Appleton grounded into an inning-ending double play at short. Cumberland added an insurance run in the ninth off Frantz when Sam Kikla led off the inning with a triple and scored on a sac fly Matt Greener. Logan Smith made a diving stab on Greener's line drive to keep the rally in check and record the first out of the inning. Alex Tolmachoff retired the next two batters with a ground ball and strike out to give Campbellsville one last shot in the bottom of the ninth.

However, Wilkerson was too good, striking out three of four hitters faced in the ninth.

The loss ends Campbellsville's "scrapping and clawing" season with 42 wins. Only three other CU teams have won more games.

"I can't fault our effort at all. With all the adversity we had and being .500 in mid March (10-10), we overachieved in some ways top to bottom. To win 42 games showed these guys have heart and fire," Sanders said. "We're disappointed now, but we have a good recruiting class coming in and the future looks bright."

Through the course of the season the Tigers set team CU school records for at bats (1,918), hits (613), doubles (116), innings pitched (476.1) and strikeouts (414). Alex Ponich, Richie Rowland, Logan Smith and Michael Caleb broke the previous individual record of most games played in a season, which was 60. Ponich and Rowland finish the year with 64 games played, Smith (63) and Caleb (62). Ponich also set the record for most at bats in a season (222), while Caleb (220) and Rowland (215) also passed the previous mark of 211.


All entries of this diary, as well as tournament updates and live stats, can be found here

PHOTO GALLERY