Warrensburg, Mo. - The 11th ranked Missouri Southern baseball program exploded in their second game of the day to advance to the final day of the MIAA Tournament on Friday, May 12th at Crane Stadium at Tompkins Field.
The Lions (41-14) began the day against Northeastern State (25-27) in the morning for the first game of the day. Southern was led by
Cole Woods striking out eight in 6.2 innings as
Matt Miller,
Chayton Beck and
Drew Davis had an RBI.
NSU got on the board in the first inning and added two more in the fifth inning to take a 4-0 lead.
Drew Davis hit an RBI single in the bottom of the fifth and a
Chayton Beck sacrifice fly in the seventh halved the RiverHawks lead, 4-2. In the eighth inning NSU scored three and in the ninth added another run to claim a 8-3 win as
Matt Miller collected an RBI with a sacrifice fly in the eighth.
Southern would have a quick turnaround with a face off against rival Pittsburg State (33-20) in an elimination game.
Drew Davis led the way with a home run,
Treghan Parker went 3-for-5 with two RBIs and
Laif Hultine picked up the win with three strikeouts in 4.0 innings of his third win of the season.
Will Doherty began the scoring off with an RBI single up the middle in the second inning with the Gorillas scoring to tie it up 1-1 early.
Nate Mieszkowski hit a sacrifice fly in the fifth to take a one run lead with PSU scoring in the sixth to tie it up 2-2. In the ninth inning the Lions exploded for four runs with a Davis solo home run, Parker two RBI triple and an
Ethan Clark RBI single to cap off the 6-2 win to eliminate the Gorillas from the MIAA Tournament.
Up next for the Lions will be a rematch against Northeastern State at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday, May 13th with the winner advancing to face off with top seeded and tournament host Central Missouri at 3:00 p.m. in the championship game.
