CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – The Texas A&M-Corpus Christi baseball team picked up a win in its return to Chapman Field on Tuesday evening, getting out in front early and cruising to victory over Prairie View A&M by a final score of 9-2.
The biggest factor for the Islanders (6-3) on the night was the performance of its pitching staff, as a group of six arms managed to punch out a season-high 15 Panthers (4-3) hitters while combining to allow just four hits and three walks in total. Getting the day going on the mound was junior
Pierre-Luc Jacques, who made his first start with the program and tossed three innings while allowing a single unearned run on two hits and a walk with three strikeouts. The Quebec native retired eight of his first nine batters faced, only running into trouble with two outs in the third when Prairie View got on the board with an RBI single after an error extended the inning. He managed to limit the damage to just this, though, capping off his day on a high note.
After Jacques' departure, the revolving door opened up in A&M-Corpus Christi's bullpen, starting with perfect innings from both senior
Luke Singleton in the fourth and junior
Nathan Mueller in the fifth. The longest outing from a reliever came from junior
Chase Mayer, who earned the win in his first appearance of the year after facing the minimum over two frames of work, picking off the first batter that reached on a single before then retiring the next five while recording a game-high four strikeouts. Junior
John Paul Buckner followed this up with a 1-2-3 eighth inning with a pair of punchouts, and junior
Brock Thorndell worked around a two-out RBI single in the ninth to shut the door and secure the win for the team.
"To throw enough strikes, pound the zone, keep them off balance and only give up four hits, I thought that was the story of the night," Islanders head coach
Scott Malone said. "I thought our pitching was really good. Getting
Chase Mayer back after he had a great fall and a really good January, it was like we just made a trade at the trade deadline and added a new lefty that was electric tonight. You wanted to see Mueller go out and be good tonight, and he was. Singleton continued to stay on the gas, and PLJ gave us a great start from the jump."
Not to be outshone, the Islanders lineup also had a very productive day, tallying nine runs on 13 hits despite only two of these going for extra bases. The bats managed to heat up right out of the gates, starting with a run in the first on an RBI single by graduate
Cade Sanchez before then getting three in the second on a run-scoring double from graduate
Karson Krowka and RBI knocks from both senior
Christian Smith-Johnson and Sanchez. To round out this nice start, the team would add one more after an errant throw on a base hit from junior
Max Towchik allowed junior
Isaiah Afework to make his way home, making it a 5-1 game through three.
The score would stay at this mark all the way up until the seventh inning, at which point A&M-Corpus Christi would wake up to the tune of a four-run frame that put the contest out of reach. This scoring got going with one out, as after Afework and junior
Nic Schwing put some traffic on the bases on a single and a walk, juniors
Noah Cassie and
Hunter Azemar came through with singles in back-to-back plate appearances to cash in both baserunners. The remaining runs were brought home on the basepaths, with Cassie then scoring on a passed ball with the bases loaded and Azemar following right behind him on a wild pitch in the very same plate appearance.
The best individual day in the order came from Afework, who singled three times and walked twice to reach base five times on the night from the fifth spot in the order. Sanchez followed close behind by going 2-4 with a hit-by-pitch and a game-high two RBIs, and Smith-Johnson rounded out those with multi-hit games after picking up two knocks and an RBI in his five at bats. The only two extra-base hits in the game came from Krowka with his aforementioned RBI double and junior
Walker Freeman, who scored on this hit after leading off the second with a triple into the corner in right field.
"We didn't have many extra-base hits, but we just created traffic and took our walks when we needed to," Malone said. "We never made it easy on them tonight. They brought in a good left-handed arm that settled the game down and kept them in it for a long way, but every time they pushed us, I thought we answered tonight."
The Islanders will now try to keep their winning ways going in their next series over the weekend, welcoming another SWAC school in Texas Southern to town for three games starting on Friday at 6:30 p.m.
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