| Freshman Ryan Dalton went 2-for-4 with his third homer of the year and three RBIs on Friday night. |
HAMMOND, La. — No. 26 Southeastern Louisiana rallied from a five-run deficit with six unearned runs in the seventh inning and the Lions picked up a 10-9 victory against UTSA on Friday night at Alumni Field in the Southland Conference opener for both teams.
Southeastern continued its school-record start in improving to 13-1 overall, while the Roadrunners dropped to 7-5 on the season.
After falling behind 3-0 after the first two frames, the Birds erupted for four runs in the third on the strength of junior Ryan Hutson's three-run home run and two more in each of the following two panels. The Lions pulled with four with a mark in the sixth, but UTSA extended the advantage back to five with a tally in the seventh.
However, it all unraveled from there, as Southeastern plated all its runs in the bottom half of the inning with two outs and were aided by a pair of Roadrunners errors.
Justin Boudreaux reached on a fielding error by freshman first baseman Jake Wood to start the stanza, but UTSA left-handed starter Casey Selsor then coaxed consecutive ground outs to short and looked to be on his way to getting out of the inning.
However, a walk and hit batter loaded the bases and senior shortstop Lance Brown was unable to handle a grounder off the bat of Chad Gough-Fortenberry that would have ended the panel. That allowed Boudreaux to cross the plate and chased Selsor from the contest. Chris Franklin promptly greeted right-handed reliever Taylor Walton with a two-run single to center and Joe Sparacino's then launched a pinch hit three-run homer to right center that put the Lions in front for good. It was his second home run off the bench this year.
That made a winner out of Stefan Lopez (1-0), who allowed a run on three hits while striking out five in 2.2 innings in relief of starter Tyler Watkins. Franklin, who was 3-for-4 with three RBIs at the plate, moved from third base to the mound to start the eighth and retired six of the seven Roadrunners hitters he faced for his fourth save of the season.
Walton (1-1) was charged with the loss after surrendering a pair of unearned runs in his inning of work.
Senior Ryan Rummel was 3-for-5 to lead UTSA at the plate, while Hutson left the park for the third time this season. Freshman Ryan Dalton added a pair of hits, including an RBI double in the third and a two-run bomb in the fourth, which was his third long ball of the spring.
The series continues at 2 p.m. on Saturday.