SAN ANTONIO – The Texas A&M-Corpus Christi baseball team earned a huge win over Incarnate Word on Saturday afternoon, using three runs in the ninth inning to erase a late deficit and earn the series-clinching victory by the final score of 6-4.
The win was a very consequential one for the Islanders (20-22, 9-14 SLC), as it both moved them ahead of the Cardinals (18-22, 8-15 SLC) in the Southland Conference standings and gave them the tiebreaker should the two finish the season with the same conference record. It also moved them to within a game of Houston Christian for the all-important eighth seed, with the two squads set to do battle next weekend at Chapman Field.
A day after banging out 14 runs on 16 hits in their win in the opener, it took a little longer for the Islanders to get their offense going, as they traded zeroes with the Cardinals over the first couple frames. The first offense for either side came in the top of the third, with the visitors taking advantage of some good fortune when UIW made an error on a potential inning-ending double play that allowed
Christian Smith-Johnson to come all the way home from second. The hosts responded with two runs of their own in the bottom half of the same inning, but A&M-Corpus Christi punched back in the fifth, tying things up on an RBI groundout off the bat of
Max Towchik after
Will Stark and Smith-Johnson singled to lead off the frame and
Austin Russell bunted both of them into scoring position.
The roller coaster ride would continue from here, starting with another score from the Cardinals in the sixth to go back ahead. With their backs starting to get pressed against the wall as things progressed, the Islanders got a huge breakthrough in the top of the eighth, coming from a very familiar source in
Cade Sanchez. Coming up to the plate with two outs already recorded, Sanchez took a 1-0 pitch from Chase Blease and smashed it out to left field for his fourth home run of the year, a huge blast that brought the team level at four once again. This longball set a new high mark for the second baseman in his career with the team, surpassing the three homers that he hit last year for his most in a single season on the Island.
A Cardinals run in the bottom half of the same inning would put the Islanders back behind with just three outs to play with, setting the stage for the late-game heroics that earned them the huge victory. They began their rally right away against UIW closer Fawster Voytko, leading off the ninth with three straight base hits from
Jack Bergstrom, Stark and Smith-Johnson to load the bases with no one out. Russell would then tie things up again at four with perfectly executed squeeze bunt, and after a caught stealing put the team at two outs, it was
Max Towchik who came through with the swing of the day, looping an 0-1 pitch in front of a diving Jake Weaver in left field for a double that put the team ahead for the first time since the third.
Karson Krowka would then proceed to add a crucial insurance run, lacing the first pitch he saw in the next at bat through the right side of the infield to bring the score up to 6-4.
Now needing just three outs of their own to lock things up, the Islanders turned to
Easten Smith out of the bullpen, who managed to do so with little issue. The righty surrendered a leadoff base hit but worked perfect around it, striking out the next hitter and getting back-to-back flyouts to secure his first save since joining the team before last season.
The Islanders managed to reach double-digit hits in the lineup for the second straight game by pounding out 12, led by three from
Christian Smith-Johnson to make it five on the series for him so far. Stark and
Jarrett Flaggert came in right behind at two apiece, with Stark moving his line up to 7-11 with eight RBI over his last three games to continue his red-hot stretch since being inserted into the starting lineup last Sunday. On the mound,
Connor Schlect turned in a solid start, working 4.1 innings of two-run ball with no walks and two strikeouts, and
Nathan Mueller earned the win after getting the last two outs of the eighth inning to set up the comeback.
The Islanders will now try to complete their first sweep of a series in Southland Conference play this year on Sunday, returning to take on the Cardinals in the series finale from San Antonio at 1 p.m.
