SUN BELT
LOUISIANA-MONROE 3, ARKANSAS STATE 1
Arkansas State’s three-game winning streak was snapped Sunday afternoon by Louisiana-Monroe at Warhawk Field in Monroe, La.
Chandler Hawkins and John Koch combined to allow three runs on four hits, but the Red Wolves (22-18, 8-10 Sun Belt Conference) stranded seven runners and did not have a runner reach second base after the fourth inning.
Ryan Emery’s RBI single in the top of the first inning scored Kaleb Brown to give the Red Wolves a 1-0 lead.
But the Warhawks (15-25, 5-13) scored two runs in the third inning to take a 2-1 lead. Dalton Herrington’s RBI single off Hawkins scored Kodie Tidwell and Koch gave up a run-scoring double to Jeff Fuller. Louisiana-Monroe added a run in the fourth for a 3-1 advantage.
TROY 10, UALR 5
Troy scored 10 runs over the fifth, sixth and seventh innings to break open a scoreless game on its way to a three game sweep of UALR at Riddle-Pace Field in Troy, Ala.
Troy (29-11, 11-7) scored four runs in the fifth, one in the sixth and five in the seventh. In the fifth, Tyler Vaughn hit a two-run double, Jake Harrell scored on a passed ball and Logan Pierce had a run-scoring single.
UALR’s Austin Pfeiffer (2 for 5) homered in the top of the sixth, but Troy extended its lead to 5-1 in the sixth on Josh McDorman’s sacrifice fly.
Danny Collins made it 7-1 in the seventh with a two-run double. Trae Santos followed with a two-run single and McDorman hit an RBI single for a 10-1 advantage.
John Clark hit a three-run home run in the eighth and Bryson Thionnet also homered in the ninth for the Trojans (18-20, 5-12), who swept Oklahoma in a doubleheader Tuesday before losing three consecutive to Troy.
SOUTHLAND
CENTRAL ARKANSAS 8, TEXAS A&M-CC 7
Central Arkansas held on to beat Texas A&M-Corpus Christi to take 2 of 3 at Chapman Field in Corpus Christi, Texas.
The 28 victories for the Bears (28-10, 8-7 Southland Conference) is the most since UCA moved to NCAA Division I in 2007.
UCA closer Ethan McKinzie pitched a scoreless ninth inning, getting consecutive ground outs and striking out Russell Vaughn to earn his fourth save of the season.
After being held to one hit in Saturday’s 3-0 loss to the Islanders, the Bears took a 3-0 lead in the top of the first on Blake Marchal’s two-run single and Chris Townsend’s RBI single.
Texas A&M-CC scored one run in the bottom of the second, but UCA responded in the top of the fourth with Garrett Brown’s RBI single for a 4-1 advantage. The Islanders (22-17, 9-6) chased UCA starter Bryce Biggerstaff in the bottom of the inning, scoring two runs to cut the lead to 4-3.
UCA extended its lead to 8-3 in the sixth, taking advantage of three Texas A&M-CC errors. Justin Treece hit a two-run single and Garrett Brown scored on a balk. Treece later scored on the Islanders’ third error of the inning.
Texas A&M-CC scored four runs in the bottom of the eighth to pull within 8-7, but was as close as the Islanders would get.
Blake Clayton (1-0) pitched four innings of relief to earn the victory for the Bears.
SWAC
SAMFORD 17, ARKANSAS-PINE BLUFF 9
Samford completed a three-game sweep of Arkansas-Pine Bluff in a nonconference series at Joe Lee Griffin Field in Birmingham, Ala.
The Bulldogs scored five runs in the bottom of the fifth to take a 5-1 lead, but the Golden Lions answered with four runs in the top of the second to tie the game at 5-5. Samford then took a 6-5 lead in the bottom of the second.
UAPB came back to tie the game at 9-9 in the top of the sixth on Mike Wieland’s two-run single.
Samford responded with a six-run bottom of the sixth to pull away from the Golden Lions. The Bulldogs (22-19) added two runs in the seventh to complete the scoring.
Isias Alcantar finished 3 for 5 with an RBI and scored 2 runs to lead the Golden Lions (14-24).
Sports, Pages 15 on 04/22/2013