DURANT, Okla. – An offensive outburst helped the Bulldog baseball team earn their first conference win on Friday as they defeated Southeastern Oklahoma State 11-3 in the first game of a GAC doubleheader. The Savage Storm, however, would respond to win the second game 6-2 and split the set.
SWOSU 11, Southeastern 3Box Score The Bulldog offense exploded for nine runs of the final three innings as SWOSU put away the Savage Storm for a big win in game one.
Jon Chidester pitched a gem for the Bulldogs, allowing just three hits and three runs while striking out four Southeastern batters to pick up the win and improve to 2-2 on the year.
Korbin Polston got the Bulldogs going offensive with a solo home run over the left field fence in the first inning before
Cole Wagner made it 2-0 after drawing a bases-loaded walk in the fourth, scoring
Nolan Barrientos. While Chidester was keeping the Savage Storm offense at bay, SWOSU scored an unearned run in the seventh before a three-run inning in the eighth broke the game open
Jacob Spring triple and scored on a single from
Haden Houska, who came around to score on a wild pitch before
CJ Faddis stole home for the third run of the inning. Southeastern scored one run in the seventh and two in the eight, sending the game to the ninth inning with a 6-3 advantage in favor of the Bulldogs.
SWOSU put the game out of reach in the top of the ninth, needing just one hit to score five insurance runs for
Ethan Davis, who entered the game in the eighth inning in relief of Chidester. Houska came through with an RBI single before Faddis drew a bases-loaded walk for the second run. Spring and Houska both scored on wild pitches before
Christian Perez brought Faddis home on a fielder's choice with one out in the inning. Davis allowed one hit in the bottom of the ninth, but recorded the final three outs in the win.
The middle of the lineup came in clutch for SWOSU with Polston, Barrientos, Spring, Houska and Faddis all scoring twice while Houska had a team-best two RBI as the Bulldogs scored 11 runs with just eight hits in the game.
Southeastern 6, SWOSU 1Box Score Perez singled down the right field line to lead off the second game and was worked into scoring position before coming across to score on a fielding error by Southeastern, but that run proved to be the extent of the Bulldogs offense in game two.
Southeastern scored four runs in the bottom of the first inning and added two in the third to avoid any threat from the Bulldogs.
Connor Garcia survived 2.1 innings but allowed five earned runs on four hits before
Austin Hilton relieved him for the final 3.2 innings. It was Garcia who took the loss, falling to 0-3 on the year.
SWOSU finished with just five hits in the game and Perez was the only player to record a multi-hit game.
The Bulldogs are now 3-9 (1-4 GAC) on the year heading into the final game of their second GAC series. SWOSU and Southeastern will face off at 1 pm tomorrow in the rubber match of the three-game set.
