Waxahachie, Texas. – The Tiger baseball team headed down south for the final series of the regular season this past weekend against the Nelson University Lions. The team was eyeing a series win to clinch a home series in round 1 of the SAC Tournament.
Game 1 would be the single 9 inning game in the series, the Tigers led 3-0 early before both teams failed to score until deeper into the game. the Lions got on the board in the 7th with 2 runs to cut the Tiger lead to 3-2. Mason Bowden homered in the 8th to give the Tigers a very important insurance run as the Lions trailed 4-2 in the final inning but began to put pressure on. Andrew Huxman initially attempted to close it out for the Tigers but allowed a run and worked into a 2 out jam. So the Tigers brought in Kurt Ippolito from Center to get the final out, he would bare down and generate a line out to right field to earn the save as the Tigers won a thriller 4-3.
Game 2 would all around go the Tigers way as they cruised to a 6-0 win. Mason Bowden hit a sacrifice fly, Derex Cancel hit a 2 run homer, and Kurt Ippolito hit a bases clearing double to provide the offense. Justin Evasovic pitched a gem for the Tigers as he had given up just 1 hit going into the 7th and earned a complete game shutout. This win officially clinched the team a top 4 seed in the conference.
Game 3 unfortunately did not go well for the Tigers, they would score early but the Lions got to Nick Julian early and forced him out of the game after just 2.1 IP scoring 8 runs in the 3rd. The Lions would add more runs throughout the game and defeat the Tigers 17-4. Despite the outcome and score this loss wouldn’t hurt the Tigers as they again had clinched a top 4 seed by winning the first two games.
The Tigers are now 21-22 (15-12) on the season and will take on McPherson College today before battling Nelson again at home in the first round of the SAC tournament this weekend as Nelson jumped into 5th place after their game 3 win.
