The Missouri State baseball team scored a season-high 16 runs and tied a school record with five sacrifice flies in a 16-3 non-conference victory over intrastate rival Southeast Missouri State Tuesday evening at Hammons Field.
The Bears scored in seven of eight innings while improving to 16-12 on the year. SEMO dropped to 19-9.
Leadoff man Ben Woodbury scored a career-high four runs and No. 2 hitter Nolan Keane had four RBIs to lead the offensive charge. Ten different players had an RBI.
Tim Clubb went seven innings to improve to 4-0 on the season. The freshman righthander allowed five hits and a run without issuing a walk.
After SEMO scored a run in the top of the first, Woodbury drew a leadoff walk and Keane turned on a 3-2 pitch and hit a bomb down the right field line that was originally ruled foul. Following an umpire conference, Keane was awarded his fourth home run of the season and the Bears were up 2-1 after two batters. MSU went on to load bases and tacked on another run on Kyle Paul’s sacrifice fly.
Keane added to his RBI total with a sacrifice fly in the second. Matt Lawson hit another sac fly and ended up on second base when the left fielder dropped the ball. Ryan Mantle singled to bring home Lawson as the Bears pushed three more runs across on just one hit for a 6-1 lead.
Josh Mazzola reached all the way to third base on another dropped fly ball in the third and scored on Mattson’s squeeze bunt. With two outs, Woodbury doubled to left and scored on Keane’s single up the middle to extend the advantage to 8-1 after three frames.
Southeast Missouri State’s third pitcher of the night, Mike Taylor, hit Mattson and issued two walks to load the bases with no outs in the fifth. Taylor walked Lawson to force Mattson home and then left the game for Matt Carter. Mantle and Brayden Drake hit back-to-back sacrifice flies, and Drake’s tied a school record as the team’s fifth of the contest.
The Bears loaded the bases with no outs again in the sixth, this time on three consecutive singles. Woodbury drove two runs home with a single to left center. Lawson singled and Shane Elenz drew a bases loaded walk for the RBI and a 14-1 lead.
Christian Overstreet tallied his first RBI as a Bear with a pinch-hit single in the seventh, and Dallas Hord added an RBI in the eighth.
Sean Toler pitched the final two frames and struck out four.
The two-game series concludes at 3 p.m. Wednesday.
