Bowling Green State University
LOUISVILLE
Baseball Team Drops Opener At Louisville
February 27, 2009 | Baseball
Feb. 27, 2009
LOUISVILLE, KY. - The Louisville baseball team, ranked as high as 26th in the nation, scored 10 runs in their last two at-bats to come from behind and beat Bowling Green by a 16-5 score. The Falcons led 4-1 after three innings, but could manage only two more runs the rest of the way in losing for the fourth-straight time to open the season.
The Falcons jumped on Louisville left-handed starter Justin Marks for a run in their first at-bat as with two outs junior catcher Tyler Elkins doubled and junior third baseman Derek Spencer followed with an RBI double to get the Falcons on the board. Marks was a second-team preseason All-America selection by several publications and was chosen as the preseason Big East Pitcher of the Year.
BG extended its lead to 4-0 in the top of third as junior outfielder T.J. Blanton led off with a home run and after a walk and a bunt single, Elkins stroked an RBI single and Spencer followed with a sacrifice fly for his second RBI of the game.
Louisville quickly cut the deficit in half with home runs from sophomore Nate Holland, in the third inning, and junior first baseman Andrew Clark,who led off the bottom of the fourth with a round tripper.
The Cardinals took their first lead of game in the fifth when they got a run on a single, balk, fly out and passed ball. Then with two outs in the same inning, Holland homered for a second time in the game to end the day for BGSU starter Dusty Hawk. Sophomore Josh Holland then greeted BG freshman reliever Ross Gerdeman with a home run to left field as the Cardinals took a 5-4 edge.
But, the Falcons came right back in their half of the sixth to score a pair runs to re-take the lead.
Junior Dennis Vaughn led off the inning drawing a walk. After a single from junior Mark Galvin, senior Ryan Shay reached on an error to load the bases with one out. The Falcons would score two runs on a Louisville error, but would not score any more the rest of the game.
Louisville, the defending Big East champion and the preseason pick of the league's coaches to repeat, then would put the game away with four runs on two hits in their half of the seventh inning and then they added six runs on six hits in the eighth inning. Three BG errors in the seventh inning contributed to that Louisville rally and Clark hit his second home run of the game, a grand slam, to greet BG sophomore reliever Dan Parsons to key the Louisville rally in the eighth.
The Falcons, who managed a total of nine hits in the last two games of their series last weekend at Western Carolina, had two or more hits in four innings and ended the game on equal terms with the Cardinals as both teams had 14 hits in the contest. The Falcons got a hit from every position in the batting order except one.
Junior Logan Meisler led the Falcons with three hits while Shay, senior Brian Hangbers, Blanton and Elkins had a pair of safeties.
Hawk made his second start of the season and went 4.2 innings yielding five hits and four earned runs. Gerdeman suffered the loss in relief.
With the loss the Falcons drop to 0-4 on the season while Louisville is now 2-3. The same two teams play Saturday with the first pitch at 1:00. They also have a single game Sunday starting at the same time.
