GALESBURG, Ill. – How best to bounce back from a stunning 12-11 loss where the opponent made a big comeback to win?
 
By doing the exact same thing to your next opponent.
 
After surrendering eight runs to St. Norbert College in the bottom of the ninth inning of Friday's Midwest Conference Baseball Tournament opener, Grinnell College rallied from a late 11-6 deficit to defeat Lawrence University 12-11.
 
That kept the Pioneers alive in the double-elimination event, where they earned a rematch against St. Norbert at 10 a.m. Saturday in Monmouth. Additionally Friday, Sam Galanek '18 broke the school record for at bats in a season with 147.
 
Grinnell and Lawrence combined for 31 hits, with Grinnell getting four of those. Jared Booth '21 and Riley Guieb '21 had three hits each, while Sam Galanek '18, Nathan Zaroban '18 and Quinton McNitt '21 added two apiece.
 
Nate Lu '21, the fourth of four Grinnell pitchers, tossed scoreless ball over the final 3-2/3 innings to get the win. He struck out five.
 
Lawrence scored a run in the top of the first, but the Pioneers answered with four in the bottom of the inning with the aid of Booth's RBI single to right and Benjamin Wong's '18 RBI double down the left-field line.
 
Grinnell made it 6-1 in the second as Galanek and Booth both hit run-scoring doubles. But then Lawrence came back, scoring 10 unanswered runs for an 11-6 edge after the top of the sixth.
 
The Pioneers gradually chipped away. Zaroban had an RBI double to left-center and Booth an RBI groundout in the bottom of the sixth to make it 11-8. Grinnell tacked on two more runs in the seventh as Galanek hit an RBI infield single and Zaroban sent a sacrifice fly to right.
 
In the eighth, Booth scored on an error and McNitt delivered an RBI single through the right side to put Grinnell ahead for good.
 
In the St. Norbert game, Grinnell went up 2-0 as Guieb hit an RBI double in the second and Carson Gampell '20 walked with the bases loaded in the third. However, St. Norbert came back to take a 4-2 lead.
 
Grinnell got back on track in the fifth with five runs. Zaroban had an RBI single, Galanek scored on an error, Wong hit an RBI single and McNitt plated two more runs with a single for a 7-4 lead.
 
The Pioneers put up four more runs in the eighth as Guieb had a solo homer, Galanek an RBI double and Zaroban a two-run homer for an 11-4 lead. However, the Green Knights put together a big final inning to squeeze out the win.
 
Grinnell managed 11 hits in the game, with three by Zaroban and two each by Andrew Shults '19, Galanek and Guieb. The pitcher of record for the Pioneers, who are now 17-21, was Charles Carr '19.

Galanek continued to climb up Grinnell's career top 10 chart. After Friday, he is third in hits (162), sixth in fielding chances (626), seventh in at bats (473) and eighth in runs scored (103) and doubles (29). Shults is eighth in sacrifice hits with 14, while Gampell moved to eighth in putouts with 502.
 
Zaroban, Galanek and Shults are now tied for eighth for Grinnell in games played in a season with 37. Zaroban is third in runs scored in a season (42), seventh in doubles (13) and total bases (85) and 10th in hits (50). Galanek is fourth in hits with 54, doubles with 15 and total bases with 84, while Shults is seventh in walks with 25 and eighth in hits with 51. Wong now ranks ninth in assists with 105.