Baseball falls at Arkansas State, 4-3

Tuesday, March 1

Jonesboro, Ark.

4:00 P.M.

Southern Illinois University

2-6

Arkansas St.

3-6

Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	Runs R	Hits H	Errors E
Southern Illinois	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	2	3	5	2
Arkansas State	0	0	0	0	4	0	0	0	X	4	9	1

03/01/2011 | 12:00:00 | Baseball

Box Score

March 1, 2011

By Jason Clay
SIUSalukis.com

Box Score

JONESBORO, Ark. - Arkansas State used a four-run fifth inning to hand the Southern Illinois baseball team its fifth consecutive loss, as the Red Wolves defeated the Salukis, 4-3, Tuesday at Tomlinson Stadium.

ASU (3-6) had nine hits in the game and had its chances to really blow by SIU (2-6), but only managed the one big inning. The Red Wolves had the bases loaded in three different innings and finished the game stranding 11 runners on base.

Arkansas State right-hander Brad Allen (1-0) picked up his first win of the year by giving up just three hits and one run in seven innings. He struck out four and walked three in his second start of the season.

Reliever Brandon Farley earned his first save of the season, as he threw three innings to close out the game.

Saluki freshman reliever Peter Slavonic (0-1) drew the loss Tuesday. He was responsible for all four ASU runs in the fifth that ended up winning the game for the Red Wolves. SIU starter Andrew Bever lasted 3.1 innings, giving up no runs and three hits. He walked three and struck out one.

The Saluki bats went stagnant really until the ninth inning, when doubles from Brock Harding and Nick Johnson plated two runs. Johnson drove in the two, but SIU could not bring him home from second to tie the game.

Second baseman Wes Neece hit his third double in 11 at-bats this year. He finished the game going 1-for-2 with two walks and he scored SIU's first run of the game in the fourth.

Junior Jordan Sivertsen saw his seven-game hitting streak come to an end. He was 0-for-2 with a walk, but had a sacrifice fly in the fourth inning.

The Salukis overcame a sloppy start and had luck on their side early on. SIU committed two early errors and Arkansas State had the bases loaded in the second and fourth innings, but no runs came home.

Neece saved SIU in the second with his diving stop on a ground ball that ended the inning. Then in the fourth, Slavonic got SIU out of another jam. He entered with one out and the bases loaded, but ended the threat with a strikeout and pop out to deep center.

In all, Arkansas State had stranded nine base runners through the first four innings.

However, it all caught up with Southern in the fifth. ASU loaded the bases up for the third time in the game, but with no outs this time. The Red Wolves had five-straight singles to start the inning off and ended up scoring four runs to take a 4-1 lead.

Southern finally got something going in the ninth. Austin Montgomery was hit by a pitch to start the inning and then Harding doubled to put runners on second and third with no outs.

After an out, Johnson cut the ASU lead down to one with his double to right that scored two. However, Farley retired Brian Bajer and Kollin Dowdy to end the game.