No. 4 Baseball Falls in Extra Innings

LAURINBURG, N.C.- The fourth-ranked baseball team fell in extra innings in the final game of the Appalachian Athletic Conference (AAC) series against the St. Andrews University Knights on Saturday. The team fell 6-5.

TWU took the first lead of the game off a sacrifice fly in the third inning. Kruise Newman started the inning with a double and got to third on a Devin Dixon sac bunt. After a walk and a stolen base got Kurtis Reid to second, Newman scored on Chris Catalano's sacrifice fly. Reid, who had moved to third in the process of the sacrifice fly, scored on a passed ball, giving the team a 2-0 lead after the top of the third inning. St. Andrews scored in the bottom of the third inning.

After the sixth inning, the score was 3-2 in favor of the Bulldogs. The team's run came in the form of a Josh Shelly solo home run. A three-run eighth inning put Tennessee Wesleyan in a 5-3 hole to begin the ninth inning. By the end of the top of the ninth inning, the Bulldogs had tied the score.

Corbin Shaw opened the ninth with a single, and pinch-runner Jonathan Bosque moved to second on a passed ball. After back-to-back walks loaded the bases, a third consecutive walk on Reid's at-bat brought in Bosque. The fourth walk of the inning, this time by Shelly, tied the game as Newman scored. The team was not able to find another run before St. Andrews scored a run in the bottom of the tenth to win the game. 

Christian Delashmit had seven strikeouts in 5.1 innings on the mound.

Entering the final week of regular season play, TWU holds a 35-11 overall record and a 20-7 AAC record. The regular season title is still in play for the Bulldogs. Tennessee Wesleyan needs to win their last three games against Union Commonwealth University and needs Reinhardt University to drop one of their final games as the Bulldogs hold the tiebreaker. The three-game road AAC series begins with a single game on Thursday at 1:00 p.m.