Stephen F. Austin
Northwestern State
Demons Squeak By SFA To Take Series
4/1/2012 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
April 1, 2012
NATCHITOCHES, La. - Stephen F. Austin managed only five hits and Northwestern State's two-run sixth inning proved to be just enough as the Demons squeaked by the Lumberjacks 2-0 in the series finale at Brown-Stroud Field.
It was a hard-luck loss for SFA (12-16, 5-7 SLC) starter Colton Eubanks, who was saddled with the loss despite allowing just two runs in the deciding sixth inning. He allowed a leadoff hit in the first inning before setting the next 10 hitters down in order, but allowed four of the five Demon (12-14, 9-3 SLC) hits on the day in the sixth frame.
Joe Scanio picked up his second straight win, while Mason Melotakis got his second straight save, with the duo working around four hits in the final 3.1 innings to close out the second straight Demon win of the series.
The `Jacks hit the ball well for the majority of the afternoon, but were hard pressed to find any holes in the Demon defense. Four `Jacks finished with a hit apiece, including doubles from Freddy Villalobos and Max Lamantia, but the Demons still found a way to take their second straight game despite only having one extra-base hit in the final 20 innings of the series.
Northwestern starter Andrew Adams put together a solid outing as well, striking out six and allowing just one hit in 5.2 innings of work. Alex Moshier and Cass Ingvardsen each had an inning of no-hit relief with the Demons never able to manage anything more than a leadoff infield hit in the first inning other than their four hits in the sixth.
SFA left runners in scoring position three times in stranding eight runners on the day, but were just 1-for-12 with runners on base and 0-for-4 with runners in scoring position on the day.
Eubanks and Adams had dueling one-hit shutouts after five innings, but Adams was lifted with two down in the sixth and the Demons finally got to Eubanks in their half of the inning for a pair of runs. Drew Helenihi started the rally with a one-out single, and after Jordan Buckley flew out to center, Nick Purdy placed a double directly on the left-field line for a run-scoring double. Colin Bear followed with a hard single up the middle, quickly giving the Demons a 2-0 advantage.
SFA will try and get back into the win column on Tuesday when it hosts Louisiana Tech in a 3:00 p.m. game at Jaycees Field.
-SFA-
