ST. LOUIS – The University of Missouri-St. Louis baseball team got a walk-off single from
Brandon Johnson with two out in the bottom of the 10th to defeat Illinois Springfield 7-6 in the second game of its doubleheader on Friday afternoon at CarShield Field in O'Fallon, Mo. The Prairie Stars won the first game 16-4 in seven innings.
Game 2 – UMSL 7, UIS 6 10 innings
The Tritons (4-6) struck first in the second game as
Justin Terhaar was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded scoring
Justin Simard with the first run of the game.
UMSL added to its lead in the fifth as Terhaar brought home Simard again this time with a sacrifice fly to center.
Mitch Bonczkowski added an RBI single to left scoring
Cooper Blythe.
Eli Cartwright held UIS (6-3) scoreless through five before giving up a run in the sixth on a sacrifice fly to center off the bat of Johnny Wendling that scored Parker Heistand.
The Tritons added two more in their half of the sixth to extend the lead to 5-1. Blythe dropped down a safety squeeze to bring home Simard and then Terhaar drove in his third run of the game with a single to left scoring Johnson.
The Prairie Stars got two unearned runs in the seventh to cut the lead in half and then tied it in the ninth on Tommy Atkinson's two-out two-run single to left.
UIS took its first lead of the nightcap in the 10th on a two-out double to left from Noah Caceres. The Stars tried to score a second run on the play but UMSL executed a perfect relay throw to cut down Tyler Thompson at the plate.
The Tritons scored two in the home half of the frame to win it. With two out, Simard hit a ground ball to short. Hunter Moser tried to get the final out at second but Caceres dropped the throw and
Ethan Landis never stopped running as he scored the tying run from second. Johnson followed with a clean single to right scoring
LJ Randle with the winning run.
UMSL was held to seven hits in the contest and were led by Johnson with two.
Dustin Hagens pitched the final three innings to pick up his first win of the season and even his record at 1-1. He struck out four but allowed three runs on six hits.
Game 1 – UIS 16, UMSL 4 7 innings
The Prairie Stars scored first in the opener on an RBI groundout to third from Atkinson in the first inning.
The Tritons evened it up in the second on a long home run to right center off the bat of
Cade Grevengoed.
UIS got a three-run home run from Atkinson in the third to retake the lead. UMSL got a run back in its half of the third on an RBI double to right from
Owen Faith to make it 4-2. The Stars hit a two-run home run in the firth and added two more in the fifth to make it 8-2.
The Tritons got back-to-back RBI doubles from Terhaar and Faith in the fifth cut the UIS lead in half but the Prairie Stars broke it open against UMSL's bullpen scoring three runs in the sixth and five in the seventh for the final margin.
The Tritons had seven hits in game one and were led by Terhaar and Faith with two each.
Bryce Nicolay gave up eight runs, three earned, on nine hits in five innings pitched and fell to 0-2 on the season.
UMSL and UIS resume their four-game series with another doubleheader on Saturday at the UIS Baseball Field in Springfield, Ill., starting at 11:30 a.m.
