FAYETTEVILLE - After Arkansas closer Colby Suggs earned saves in six consecutive games over a 14-day period, including two in less than 20 hours at Kentucky, the junior right-hander with the 95 mph-plus fastball wasn’t available for the second game of last Saturday’s doubleheader.

Suggs, who pitched the ninth inning of a 2-1 victory Friday night and 5-3 victory in Saturday’s opener, told Arkansas Coach Dave Van Horn before the series finale that he didn’t feel he could go in the nightcap.

With Suggs unavailable, Kentucky rallied for a 4-3 victory, scoring three unearned runs in the bottom of the ninth inning with four singles against Arkansas relievers Trent Daniel and Landon Simpson sandwiched around an error by second baseman Jordan Farris.

“I know that if [Suggs] could have gone in that game, he would have come down to me and said, ‘Hey, I changed my mind. I’m good to go,’ ” Van Horn said Monday after speaking at Arkansas’ Swatter’s Club meeting. “When he didn’t, I knew he wasn’t ready.

“His arm was a little tired, and it was sore. … Hey, if we throw him out there, we might win the game. But then we might not have him for two weeks or he might hurt himself. It wasn’t worth it.”

Suggs, who has a 1.72 ERA with eight saves, hasn’t allowed a run in his past 13 appearances over 11 2/3 innings. His ability to fill the closer’s role has allowed the Razorbacks to have Barrett Astin in their starting rotation for the past seven SEC series.

Van Horn said he appreciated Suggs - who earlier this season returned too soon from an oblique injury and struggled with his control - being honest between games Saturday about how his arm felt.

“If he had gone out there and said, ‘Yeah, I’m OK,’ and then said after the game, ‘I never should have gone out there, my arm’s killing me,’ then I would have been upset with him,” Van Horn said. “But he did the right thing. He was honest, up front.

“He’d thrown two times on the weekend. He’d gotten two saves. We might not have won either one of those games without him.”

It appeared Arkansas was set to win the third game at Kentucky even without Suggs.

“We just didn’t make a play, and that’s life,” Van Horn said. “What we should have done was score some more runs earlier.”

Simpson got Matt Reida to hit a ground ball with two outs and two on in the ninth, but Farris booted it, and the Wildcats scored a run to pull within 3-2. Kyle Barrett and Zac Zellers followed with RBI singles to tie and win the game.

It was Farris’ first error in nine SEC starts and the only error committed by Arkansas during the Kentucky series.

“Farris [is] a tough kid,” Van Horn said. “He felt horrible, you could tell.

“If you hit him that same ground ball 100 times, he’s going to field it 99, because he’s going to make a bad read one time.”

Van Horn said Farris got an in-between hop he couldn’t handle after getting “locked in” too quickly.

“A lot of times a ball hit right at you is the hardest play,” said Van Horn, who played second base for the Razorbacks in 1982. “It’s actually easier if it’s hit hard because - bang! - it’s just there.”

Van Horn has credited Farris, a freshman, with helping stabilize the Razorbacks’ defense since being inserted into the starting lineup along with shortstop Brett McAfee.

“Our defense has gotten so much better the last two weeks,” Van Horn said. “The fielding percentage compared to the previous eight weeks, it’s night and day.

“That’s one reason we’ve been winning. We’ve been pitching well, but we also haven’t been making mistakes in the field.”

Van Horn said Farris will be in the starting lineup Friday night when the Razorbacks (32-16, 15-8 SEC), ranked 11th by Baseball America and 12th by Collegiate Baseball, open their final home series against Tennessee (18-26, 6-16) at Baum Stadium.

Collegiate Baseball

TUCSON, Ariz. - The Collegiate Baseball poll with records through Sunday, points and previous rank. Voting is done by coaches, sports writers and sports information directors: REC. PTS. PVS 1. Vanderbilt 41-6 497 1 2. North Carolina 42-4 496 2 3. LSU 43-6 494 3 4. Cal State Fullerton 39-7 492 4 5. Oregon State 37-8 489 5 6. Oregon 37-11 488 6 7. N.C. State 37-11 485 7 8. Virginia 39-8 484 8 9. Florida State 38-9 482 9 10. Louisville 37-10 476 11 11. UCLA 31-13 473 12 12. Arkansas 32-16 469 16 13. Oklahoma 34-14 467 10 14. Arizona State 30-14-1 464 13 15. Clemson 30-15 462 14 16. South Carolina 33-14 459 15 17. Pittsburgh 36-11 458 17 18. New Mexico 30-17 456 18 19. Stanford 26-16 452 22 20. South Florida 31-16 448 20 21. Indiana 35-9 444 21 22. Cal Poly 31-14 440 24 23. South Alabama 36-13 438 25 24. Mississippi State 36-13 435 28 25. Troy 35-12 432 - 26. Rice 31-15 429 27 27. Mississippi 33-16 427 26 28. Sam Houston St. 31-17 424 - 29. Kansas State 34-15 421 - 30. Campbell 39-9 419 29Baseball America

DURHAM, N.C. - The top 25 teams in the Baseball America poll with records through May 5 and previous ranking (voting by the staff of Baseball America): REC. PVS 1. North Carolina 42-4 1 2. Vanderbilt 41-6 2 3. LSU 43-6 3 4. Cal State Fullerton 39-7 4 5. N.C. State 37-11 5 6. Oregon State 37-8 6 7. Virginia 39-8 7 8. UCLA 31-13 9 9. Florida State 38-9 10 10. Oregon 37-11 11 11. Arkansas 32-16 14 12. Louisville 37-10 13 13. Arizona State 30-14 8 14. Indiana 35-9 16 15. South Carolina 33-14 15 16. New Mexico 30-17 17 17. Rice 31-15 19 18. Oklahoma 34-14 12 19. Clemson 30-15 18 20. South Alabama 36-13 20 21. Mississippi State 36-13 22 22. Virginia Tech 30-19 25 23. South Florida 31-16 - 24. Pittsburgh 36-11 - 25. Stanford 26-16 -

Sports, Pages 17 on 05/07/2013