ACU Baseball (19-13, 10-5) grabbed its fifth series victory in a row this weekend taking down Stephen F. Austin (5-27, 2-13) on the road, two games to one. After losing a close series opener, the Wildcats were able to bounce back for two victories scoring double digits in both games.
Entering the weekend contest, the Wildcats were coming off a rough 11-1 loss to the Texas Longhorns in their mid-week matchup and were looking to get back on track after the disappointing loss.
Friday night’s game one was a rather slow one and it wouldn’t be until the third inning until the Wildcats got something started. Senior infielder Benjamin Greer opened up the inning by drawing a walk, followed by a walk to junior infielder Zandt Payne two batters later. Senior outfielder Miller Ladusau would load the bases after being hit by a pitch and graduate utility man Gino D’Alessio would draw the third walk of the inning to bring home the first run of the game for the Cats, despite still not recording a hit.
In the fourth, Greer would connect on a single up the middle to give ACU their first and surprisingly only hit of the game. Both teams would go stagnant until the bottom of the ninth where the Lumberjacks evened the game up at one on an RBI bunt and eventually won the game on a walk-off single taking game one 2-1.
Game two started much differently for the Wildcats with Payne sending an RBI double into left-center to score two and give ACU an early lead. SFA got one back in the bottom of the second, but freshman catcher Maddox Miesse singled down the left side scoring one to make it a 3-1 Wildcat lead.
The Jacks stayed calm however and scored one in the fourth and two in the fifth to take their first lead of the game at 4-3. However, the Wildcats put together a two-out rally in the top of the sixth scoring five runs in the inning that finished with D’Alessio hitting a single up the middle to score two.
Ladusau added to the lead in the eighth scoring one and the Wildcats would not let up, scoring another three in the top of the ninth after another double from Payne scored one and a double from sophomore outfielder Holden Rook scored two more to secure a 12-4 ACU victory.
Payne, Miesse and D’Alessio all finished with three hits and senior right-handed pitcher Rolando De La Cruz earned the save pitching 3.0 innings, striking out four and allowing only one hit.
In the series tiebreaker, it would be SFA who would attack early, getting a 2-0 lead at the end of the first inning. In the top of the third Greer cut the lead in half, cranking a solo shot into left-center to make it 2-1. Greer would go on to tie the game in the top of the fourth on a fielder’s choice, followed by a Ladusau taking a hit by pitch to give the Wildcats the 3-2 lead
ACU slowly began to pull away, scoring four more in the fifth, including a two-run RBI double from Greer. Despite SFA getting one more run back, junior infielder DJ Van Atten sent a two-run homer to center field to make it a 9-3 ACU lead.
Two more RBIs from Ladusau and D’Alessio in the seventh would make it an 11-3 Wildcat lead, where the ACU would hold on to take their fifth series victory in a row.
Despite the eight-run differential, both teams finished with 10 hits as well as six different pitchers being sent to the mound during the game.
The Wildcats will look for win No. 20 on Wednesday when they host Texas Tech for a non-conference mid-week matchup, with first pitch set for 6:05 p.m. at Crutcher Scott Field.
Quotes will be added following head coach Rick McCarty’s next press conference.
