CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – The Texas A&M-Corpus Christi baseball team was handed a tough loss in its conference opener against Nicholls on Friday evening, climbing out of an early hole to come within one out of victory but failing to hang on and dropping by a final score of 11-7.
The Islanders (8-6, 0-1 SLC) found themselves having to play catch up against the Colonels (8-8, 2-2 SLC) from the very beginning of the night, conceding a run in the opening frame on a two-out base hit. They would end up plating two in the bottom of the second to take the lead right back on a run-scoring groundout by junior
Jack Bergstrom and a wild pitch that allowed senior
Christian Smith-Johnson to score from third, but this wouldn't last long, as Nicholls pushed across five with two outs in the top of the third to put the hosts in a four-run hole early on.
As it turns out, A&M-Corpus Christi made up this entire deficit in one fell swoop, putting up a four spot in the fifth to make it a brand new ballgame. The outburst started with a pair of walks from graduate
Karson Krowka and junior
Noah Cassie, and after both moved up a base on a double steal, Krowka would race home on a wild pitch to score the first run of the frame. Two batters later, Cassie did the same thing on another errant offering, and with two outs and runners on second and third, redshirt junior
Jarrett Flaggert came up clutch by bouncing a 1-2 pitch through the right side to score both and tie things back up at six apiece.
After heating the bats back up, the Islanders kept up the pressure in the seventh, getting graduate
Austin Russell on base after a leadoff single and then bringing him in as the go-ahead run on a bouncer hit by graduate
Cade Sanchez where Russell just narrowly beat the throw home from the shortstop. A&M-Corpus Christi held onto this lead until the game's final frame, recording the first two outs of the ninth before seeing the bottom fall out, committing three errors and seeing the Colonels plate five to put the team right back in a four-run hole. Unlike earlier, however, it could not claw its way back this time, going down in order to end the night.
In the lineup, the lone multi-hit effort of the night went to Russell, who reached base three times by going 2-4 with a walk and a run scored. The leading RBI man ended up being Flaggert with his big swing in the fifth, while the others went to Sanchez and Bergstrom with one apiece. On the mound, junior
Nicho Crowley put together the best outing, working two scoreless innings of relief while punching out three and allowing just one total baserunner.
The Islanders will now try to shake off the defeat on Saturday, when they return to Chapman Field for a doubleheader against Nicholls to close out the series. The first game is currently set to start at 1 p.m., with the second to follow shortly after.
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