Crimson Nine Down B.U. As Brayton Wins Fourth

Roz Brayton turned in his fourth consecutive shut-out performance, and ran his record-breaking string of scoreless innings to 33 yesterday, as the Harvard baseball team downed Boston University, 3-0, at Soldiers Field.

In his two-hitter against Columbia last week, the junior lefthander broke the old Harvard record of 234 scoreless innings in a row, set by Ray Peters in 1968, and he added eight more goose eggs against the Terriers while allowing only three hits.

Brayton struck out five batters, and gave up only one walk. Sophomore Norm Walsh relieved him in the ninth and preserved the shut out.

Second baseman Vince McGugan scored what proved to be the winning run in the third inning after reaching first on a fielders choice. With one out, McGugan stole second, continued to third on the catcher's overthrow, and then raced home when the centerfielder bobbled the ball.

Terrier pitcher Ken Wnuk gave up nine well-spaced singles, and the Crimson didn't get its insurance run until the eight inning. Larry Barbiaux started the rally by singling and stealing second. Hal Smith scored him with a two-out single, and he scored all the way from first when the B.U. left fielder misplayed a single by Tim Bilodeau.

Barbiaux was three for four on the day, and Smith went two for three.

"This team doesn't have much power," Crimson coach Loyal Park said after the game. "But with consistent hitting, we should be able to win a lot of games with good base running and hit and run.

"We don't have any one or two hitters that we can rely on, but on the other hand, nobody can point to our sixth hitter and say that he's an easy out. So far this season someone has always been there to take up the slack when we needed it," Park said.

Brayton was never in trouble during his eight shut-out innings, and he didn't allow any Terrier runner to get past second base. Brayton is now 4-0, and he has turned into the type of stopper which Harvard had in Bill Kelley last year.

Mixing It Up

Brayton relies primarily on a good fastball that tails away from righthanded hitters, but yesterday he was working on mixing it up with his over-hand curve ball that drops. He throws his curve on 35 per cent of his pitches, and his change-up on 15 per cent.

Every team in the Eastern League throws its best pitcher against Harvard, and the Crimson batters will have their work cut out for them in the game against MIT on Thursday and the doubleheader with Dartmouth on Saturday.

MIT's ace, Al Dropfel, was undefeated last year except for a 9-1 loss against Harvard and this year he is attracting the attention of major league scouts. Dartmouth also has two strong pitchers which they will be saving for the games against Harvard.