The Missouri State baseball team took a 4-0 lead but was outscored 8-1 after the third inning in an 8-5 loss to Arkansas-Little Rock Tuesday afternoon at Gary Hogan Field in Little Rock.
The Bears fell to 2-3 in the season while UALR improved to 7-3 in a game that included a total of 16 walks.
MSU’s Ben Woodbury led off the game with a single and moved to second on a passed ball. Nolan Keane singled to second base and then stole second to put runners on second and third with one out. Kyle Paul plated Woodbury with a sacrifice fly to center, and Clay Coulter brought home Keane with a single to center. After Brayden Drake singled to left, Shane Elenz blooped an RBI single in front of the right fielder to score Coulter and knock UALR staff ace David Klumpp out of the game. The Bears took a 3-0 lead on Klumpp, who entered the game with a 1.10 ERA, before Ashur Tolliver got the final out of the inning.
The Bears added another run in the third. Keane singled to lead off, Paul doubled to left and Drake walked to load the bases with one out. Elenz made the second out with a sac fly to score Keane, but Josh Mazzola flied out to right to end the scoring threat.
Freshman Pat Doyle held the UALR bats in check through three innings, but opened the fourth with a walk and a single before surrendering a three-run homer to Osvaldo Torres. Doyle then hit Ryan Gotcher, who came around to score and tie the game via a stolen base and two errors. Doyle was relieved by Austin Todd with one out in the fourth, who got the Bears out of the inning with no further damage by striking out two batters, but not before the Trojans knotted the score at 4-4 by taking advantage of three errors.
After getting the leadoff man out in the fifth, three different UALR pitchers tossed four straight walks to allow MSU to regain a 5-4 lead. Ryan Mantle drew the final free pass to score Paul.
The first three Trojan batters in the fifth walked, but two were thrown out stealing to set up Gotcher’s RBI triple with two outs that tied the game at 5-5. Woodbury appeared to catch the ball after it originally bounced off his glove, but the umpires ruled that it hit the ground. UALR had two more RBI singles to retake the lead for good at 7-5.
UALR took advantage of MSU’s fourth error of the game to extend its lead to 8-5 in the eighth.
Sean Toler (0-1) took the loss for the Bears.
The Bears open the home schedule this weekend with a three-game set against Middle Tennessee State. Game times are 3 p.m. Friday, 2 p.m. Saturday and 1 p.m. Sunday.
