Box Score HOUSTON — It may have took four days, but the Arkansas Tech baseball team found some excitement at the Houston Winter Invitational, scoring the tying and go-ahead runs with two outs in the bottom of the eighth to close the event with a 6-5 victory over Tarleton State Sunday night at Minute Maid Park.

The Wonder Boys (6-6) went down and then immediately tied the game three times over the course of the night, and faced a one-run deficit with two outs and no one on base in the eighth before Bryan Heward beat out an infield single to push across two runs to go up for the first and only time against the Texans (2-2).

Heward finished the game 3-for-5 with three RBIs, while Patrick Castleberry was 2-for-2 with three walks. Collin O'Neil and Mark Vaughn each added a pair of hits and two runs scored for an offense that put together 13 hits, including a home run, two doubles and two triples.

The mirrored efforts began early, as the Wonder Boys answered the first run of the game by the Texans in the top of the second with one of their own in the bottom half. Vaughn led off with a double off the wall in left center — one of five extra-base hits for Tech in the contest — and advanced to third on Cole Fergus' fly out to center. Seth Wheeler, making his first start of the season, laced a ball to center to tie the game at 1-1.

Tarleton went right back ahead in the third, using a leadoff walk to score. The Tech bats got working quickly again though, as O'Neil, Castleberry and Heward started the bottom of the frame off with back-to-back-to-back singles, with Heward's plating O'Neil to tie it up once again.

After each team pushed a runner to third base but couldn't score in the fourth, more offense erupted in the fifth. The Texans smacked a two-run single to take the lead for a third time, but Fergus answered in a big way after Vaughn's one-out triple, blasting the first pitch he saw deep to left for his first home run of the season, bringing the score even for a third time, this time at 4-4.

Tech seemed to be in a tough spot after Tarleton went ahead in the top of the seventh and the Wonder Boys weren't able to answer in the bottom half. The Texans' bullpen picked up a quick two outs in the bottom of the eighth before Tech started the comeback with Caleb McKinnon's hard-hit infield single to short. O'Neil reached, and McKinnon advanced to third on a throwing error by Tarleton, and Castleberry worked a full-count walk to load the bases. Heward proved to be the hero, racing to first to beat out a dribbler to the second baseman, which allowed both McKinnon and O'Neil to score and give the Wonder Boys their first lead of the night.

The Tech bullpen came up big both before and after the offense finally got the lead, covering the final 2 2/3 innings without allowing a run. Nate Rutherford entered after the Texans went ahead in the seventh, picking up a quick groundout and flyout to end the frame. Ryan Vruggink shrugged off a two-out double to strike out the final batter of the eighth, and Randy Vallejo earned his second save in as many days by stranding men on second and third in the ninth.

The Wonder Boys return to action Friday, as they open Great American Conference play on the road at Ouachita Baptist.