NACOGDOCHES, Texas. – The Stephen F. Austin Baseball team (4-25, 1-11) closed out their weekend series against the visiting Tarleton State Texans (15-13, 5-7) with a thrilling 6-5 walk-off extra innings win over the Texans.
The Lumberjacks wasted no time getting on the board early as following a Cole Hill leadoff single, which extended his hitting streak to 11 games, Cal Martin would hit a single to drive in Hill from second two batters later to put SFA ahead 1-0 after the first.
Elian Balmaceda struck out the side in the top of the third inning. The Lumberjacks then came to the plate and extended their lead. Cole Hill would send his fourth homerun of the season over the left field wall to give SFA a 2-0 lead after three full innings.
SFA would keep the bats hot in the bottom of the fourth following a Hunter Prescher one-out single, Nolan Brown would crush his eighth homerun of the season over the left center field wall to push the SFA 4-0 after four complete innings. Cal Martin kept the runs coming for SFA in the bottom of the fifth as he would smoke his fourth homerun of the season that easily cleared the left field wall and extended the SFA lead to 5-0 heading into the sixth.
The Texans would break through in the top of the seventh as they would score three runs to cut the SFA lead to 5-3. The Texans would add a pair of runs in the top of the eighth to tie the game at five runs apiece.
Neither team would score in the ninth inning and this game would require extra innings to determine the outcome. The 10th inning featured another back-and-forth scoreless inning, before the Lumberjacks would find their stride in the bottom of the 11th. Nolan Brown led off the 11th as he was hit by a pitch, before Sam Adams drew a walk the very next at-bat to put a pair of runners on for SFA. Brock Knoerr pinch hit and laid down a perfect sacrifice bunt to advance Brown and Adams. Cole Hill was then intentionally walked for the second time on the afternoon to load the bases for Tom Biggs. Biggs made no mistake as he would put a ball into play to score Brown from third and give SFA a thrilling 6-5 win over Tarleton.
Tarleton’s Jake Burcham (1-3) took the loss today, while Caleb Rutledge (1-1) took the win for SFA. Cole Hill (2-4, 2 IBB, 2 R, RBI, HR) and Cal Martin (3-5, R, HR, 2 RBI) led the offensive effort for SFA, while Nolan Brown (1-4, 2 R, HBP, HR, 2 RBI) added his team-leading eighth homerun of the season and scored the winning run for the Lumberjacks.
The Lumberjacks will be back in action at home next weekend when they play host to the visiting Abilene Christian Wildcats. The series kicks off on Friday, April 5th with first pitch scheduled for 6:30 p.m. CST. You can watch the game live on WAC International, and keep up with all the action on social media and with live stats on the SFA Athletics website.
By: Jackson Pickard, Graduate Assistant for Strategic Communications