Box (PDF) | Box (HTML)

HATTIESBURG, Miss. – The Eastern Illinois baseball team dropped the second game of its season-opening series at Southern Mississippi, 9-1, on Saturday afternoon at Pete Taylor Park.

“It was not a good day,” said Eastern Illinois head coach Jim Schmitz. “We made too many defensive blunders and our hitters are not making any adjustments to the Southern Miss pitching staff.”

The Panthers (0-2) were able to get on the scoreboard first, scoring a run in the top of the first on a Ben Thoma RBI double down the left-field line to score Daniel Rowe. Three of the four EIU hits came in the first inning of the game.

The Golden Eagles (2-0) retaliated by scoring four runs in the bottom of the fist, taking a 4-1 lead. Southern Miss added another run in the second, three more runs in the fourth and one more run in the bottom of the fifth to take a 9-1 advantage.

Thoma paced the Panthers at the plate, going 1-for-3 with an RBI. Zach Borenstein, Shawn Ferguson and Rowe all added a hit in the loss. Borenstein is currently riding a 14-game hit streak dating back to the 2010 campaign after picking up a hit in both games of the season-opening series.

Newcomer Adam Clark (0-1) recorded the loss, allowing seven earned runs and eight hits in 3.1 innings of work. The EIU pitching staff combined for seven strikeouts on the day to the Golden Eagles five.

Southern Miss left a total of nine runners on base to EIU's four.

Geoffrey Thomas (1-0) picked up the win for Southern Miss, surrendering three hits and one run in seven innings of action.

The Panthers close out the series with Southern Miss at 1 p.m. on Sunday, Feb. 20.