WARRENSBURG, Mo. – The Arkansas Tech baseball team lost both ends of their road doubleheader at No. 5-ranked Central Missouri on Friday, falling 10-2 in the opener and 5-4 in 12 innings in the nightcap.
GAME ONE
In the opener, the Wonder Boys got out to an early 1-0 lead on a solo home run by Brendan Bard in the top of the second. That score held up until the bottom of the fourth when Central Missouri broke through for five runs on five hits.
Prior that frame, Tech starter
John Gray held the high-powered Mules' offense scoreless on one hit while striking out two. Gray's outing would end with that fourth inning as
Ethan Fritz came on in relief for the fifth.
Fritz held the Mules off the board in the fifth as he worked around a leadoff hit-by-pitch. In the sixth, however, the Mules struck for five runs once more. All but one of the runs in the inning were earned, however, as UCM was able to take advantage of a Tech error.
Playing the seven-inning game first, suddenly the Wonder Boys were down to their final at-bats potentially in the top of the seventh. Leading off the frame, Tech made the most of their first at-bat in the seventh as
Keaton Ranallo hammered a solo home run out to left field for Tech's second run of the game. Two batters later,
Logan Schwenke hit a one-out double to left-centerfield, but the next two Wonder Boys were retired in order to end the first game of the day.
GAME TWO
The second game saw the Wonder Boys jump out to another early advantage, this time with three runs in the top of the first inning.
In that inning, the first four batters all hit singles with the last two driving in runs.
Shane Poe led off with a single to right and was followed by a single up the middle by
Sawyer Duddleston.
Christian Olea then drove in Poe on a single through the right side of the infield. Ranallo cashed in the second run of the inning on a first-pitch single to right. The third run came on a wild pitch with Olea crossing the plate.
The Mules got one of those runs back in the bottom of the inning as the pushed across a leadoff double. In the next half inning, Tech scored a single run without the benefit of a hit the entire inning.
Brandon Bunton led off the inning with a hit-by-pitch and was followed by a plunking of Poe as well. Duddleston then successfully sacrificed them over to second and third, respectively. In the next at-bat, Bunton scored on a passed ball.
UCM would then go on to score their next three runs to tie the game at four-all all on solo home runs. The first of those came in the third while the other two reared their ugly heads in the seventh.
With the game now tied, the Wonder Boys called upon left-hander
Simon Murray in relief of
Will Horton, who got the final out of the seventh when he came on in relief. Murray would go on to shutdown the Mules over the next two innings to force the game into extra innings.
In the eighth, Murray struck out the side and picked up a fourth to end the ninth. In the bottom of the 10
th, Murray worked around a leadoff walk to send the game to the 11
th where he was masterful in not allowing a leadoff triple to score the winning run.
The solo home run came back, unfortunately in the bottom of the 12
th against a new Wonder Boy reliever as UCM walked off with the win.
UP NEXT
The Wonder Boys and Mules will conclude their four-game series on Saturday with another doubleheader. First-pitch for the first game, which will be a seven-inning contest, is scheduled for 1 p.m.
