FAYETTEVILLE -- Opportunities squandered in the early innings came back to haunt the University of Arkansas in its first loss of the young season on Sunday.
James Madison University made the most of a small-ball seventh inning against No. 4 Arkansas' bullpen to score four runs and hold on for a 7-3 win before an announced crowd of 9,134 on a sunny afternoon at Baum-Walker Stadium.
The Razorbacks (2-1) plated two runs in the first inning for starter Mason Molina but could not scratch again off Ryan Murphy and ace reliever Joe Vogatsky (1-0) for the next five innings while falling behind 6-2.
Arkansas had four runners thrown out on the bases and did not score either of two leadoff doubles in the first and third innings by Hudson White and Kendall Diggs.
"Really what I saw was that we failed to get a couple of of big hits, they got a couple of big hits," Arkansas Coach Dave Van Horn said. " We created a couple of innings and then we didn't come through. Give credit to them. They just played better than us today and they deserved to win."
Vogatsky, the Dukes' closer, pitched 4 1/3 innings and allowed 1 run on 2 hits and 3 walks on 80 pitches, the second-highest total of his career.
Vogatsky walked his first batter, leadoff man Hudson White, to load the bases in the fourth, but retired Kendall Diggs on a fly ball to right to start a string of nine consecutive outs.
"I settled in after getting out of that bases loaded," Vogatsky said. "Everything started working. Keeping them off balance was what really worked today."
Said White, "He did a really good job keeping us off balance, working both sides of the plate. Going hard in, soft away, he did a good job."
Vogatsky made it into the ninth inning before reaching his limit with a leadoff walk to White. Freshman right-hander Jackson Logar came in got a ground ball force out from Diggs, then catcher Jason Schiavone threw Diggs out at second trying to move up on a ball in the dirt. Wehiwa Aloy lined out to end the game.
"He's got good stuff," Van Horn said of Vogatsky. "He's their best guy. He kind of throws a high-carry fastball that stays on plane. He's got a good breaking ball. He threw a lot of pitches. ... He held us down while they put together a good inning. He's good."
The Arkansas first inning yielded two runs against Murphy but it could have been bigger. After White led off with a double he was picked off second base.
With two outs, Aloy singled, Ben McLaughlin doubled him in and Wagner made it 2-0 with an RBI single.
"Yeah, that first inning was an inning killer on my part," White said. "You can't get picked off if you're no outs, one out, whatever it was. But I'm excited to see how we bounce back tomorrow."
Arkansas starter Mason Molina got off to a solid debut with nine strikeouts in 3 2/3 innings. The left-hander threw three scoreless innings before running into a spot of trouble in the fourth with his pitch count mounting.
Coleman Calabrese got a one-out single for the Dukes' second hit, then Schiavone drew a two-out walk. Eight-hole hitter Wyatt Peifer brought them both home with a double to left field, ending Molina's outing.
"Things were going good early," Molina said. "Probably threw too many pitches here and there, but overall I wasn't too upset about how I threw.
"I think the fastest way to get to the next day is to flush it. It's easier said than done, but I think if we can get past this and get our heads down early tonight ... we'll be in a good spot to compete."
The Dukes had their breakthrough inning in the seventh against freshman right-hander Gabe Gaeckle, who was starting his third inning.
Peifer laid a clever bunt down the third-base line and just beat Peyton Holt's throw to the bag. Ike Schmidly was trying to bunt him over but eventually worked a key walk. Mike Mancini followed with another bunt which he beat out to load the bases to chase Gaeckle and bring on Jake Faherty.
The sophomore Faherty got ahead of slugger Fenwick Trimble 1-2 before the junior put a jam shot right up the middle for a run-scoring single. Ryan Dooley followed with fly ball to right field that put pressure on the Arkansas defense. Diggs' throw home appeared to be on target, but first baseman Jack Wagner cut it off and then fired wildly to third base to allow a second run to score on the play.
Brendan O'Donnell, who hit a 424-foot home run in the ninth inning, added an RBI groundout to complete the four-run seventh.
"Unlike last night where we scored some runs and couldn't put up a zero, we were just playing the small ball that we've been doing all year that we work on all the time," JMU Coach Marlin Ikenberry said. "It just paid off in that situation."
Van Horn said Wagner was not told to cut off Diggs' throw.
"No one said a word about relay the ball, nobody said 'Relay' and then he throws it away," Van Horn said. "That was the frustrating thing. It's just the little things that who knows where that game would have been. They had a one-run lead, the ball gets to the catcher, he tags him out, we may be rolling there.
"That's a double play and they only have one in. So we've got to do a better job of producing some runs when we have opportunities."