CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Eastern Illinois baseball team (3-4, 0-0 OVC) dropped their series opener at Austin Peay (6-4, 0-0 ASUN) by a score of 12-5 on Friday evening.
The Panthers offense posted five runs on ten hits and one error, stranding 10 runners on base.
Ethan Rossi led the way with three hits in four at-bats, including a two-run home run.
Chris Worcester went 2-3 with a double and one RBI, while
Sam Wiese recorded a hit for the fourth consecutive game with a 2-4 outing.
Christian Carew suffered the loss after giving up four earned runs on four hits with a pair of strikeouts through three innings of work.
Eli Cartwright and
Elijah Green allowed zero earned runs in a combined 3.1 innings in relief.
After three of EIU's first four batters reached base to start the game,
Cade Zalewski was hit by a pitch to bring home the evening's first run. The Panthers tacked on one more with a Christ Worcester RBI single in the next at-bat before Peay got out of the inning with a strikeout and fly out.
The Governors responded loudly in the bottom of the first with a pair of round trippers, including from lead-off man Kyler Proctor. Gus Freeman delivered the next homer with a man on to give Austin Peay an early 3-2 lead.
After a quiet second inning, Peay extended the lead in the third with a Cameron Nickens RBI single. Nickens scored on a throwing error later in the inning to make the score 5-2.
In the fourth,
Chris Worcester reached base with a lead-off double before
Ethan Rossi homered to right center to draw the Panthers back to within one.
The Governors scored the next two runs with John Bay scoring on a passed ball in the fifth before a Nickens RBI double in the seventh pushed the lead back to three.
The Panthers got one back on the eighth with a
Zak Goodwin pinch hit RBI single, but after a pitching change with two on and nobody out, the next three EIU batters were set down in order to stifle the potential rally.
Austin Peay broke the game open in the bottom of the eighth with a Proctor RBI double and Nickens three-run homer that put the game out of reach for Eastern, as the Panthers were unable to mount a comeback in their final at-bat.
EIU will look to respond in game two, which is set for 1 p.m. on Saturday. The series finale will follow at 1 p.m. Sunday.
