HOUSTON – With HBU senior lefthander
Christian Thames injuring his pitching hand on a ground ball, sophomore righthander
Daniel Endsley delivered five shutout innings and sophomore righty
JT Newton closed out the Huskies' 5-3 victory over Central Arkansas to even the Southland Conference baseball series Saturday afternoon at Husky Field.
Endsley (1-2) held the Bears (16-16, 6-8 SLC) scoreless on two hits with six strikeouts and four walks. Newton posted his fourth save of the season holding UCA scoreless on one hit with a strikeout in 1.1 innings for the Huskies (14-14, 6-5). Thames allowed three runs on four hits with three walks in 2.1 innings.
Senior centerfielder
Zane Otten went 2-for-4 with a double, an RBI and scored a run, while senior catcher
Blake Thomas went 2-for-3 with an RBI and scored for HBU. Junior designated hitter
Carey Jones homered and junior first baseman
Jake Pulcheon doubled and drove in a run. Junior shortstop
Tyler Depreta-Johnson singled and scored to extend his hitting streak to eight games, while junior leftfielder
Spencer Halloran singled, drove in a run and scored.
Righthander Cody Davenport (2-1) went the distance for UCA, throwing 110 pitches, and giving up five runs, four earned, on eight hits with a strikeout and two walks in 8.0 innings.
Jansen McCurdy doubled and drove in a pair, while Dusty Wright went 2-for-4 and scored a run for the Bears.
The Huskies jumped out to an early lead when Halloran singled with two outs in the first, then Pulcheon ripped an RBI double to leftcenter.
The Bears answered in the top of the second as Michael Haun drew a two-out walk, Wright singled to right and Keaton Presley walked to load the bases. McCurdy hit a grounder back up the middle that hit the second-base bag and caromed into leftcenter for a two-run double.
HBU tied it in the bottom half of the inning when Jones blasted a solo home run, his third of the season, just fair down the leftfield line.
In the third, Rigo Aguilar led off with a triple to rightcenter and scored on William Hancock's groundout to put the Bears back up, 3-2. On the play, Thames tried to barehand the grounder, then gave up a long single off the wall to Eddie Sanchez. Endsley got Brooks Balisterri to ground into a double play to end the inning and shut UCA down over the next four.
Jones drew a walk to lead off the fifth, but was thrown out on a failed hit-and-run. Thomas then singled to right and took second on a fielding error by the rightfielder. After junior second baseman
Jack Fitzgerald popped out to the catcher for the second out, Otten came through with an RBI single to left to tie the game, 3-3.
Depreta-Johnson led off the seventh with a single to left, then went to second on a wild pitch. Thomas put the Huskies ahead with an RBI single through the left side. HBU added a run in the eighth when Otten led off with a double and went to third on a sacrifice bunt by senior rightfielder
Brandon Brintz. Halloran lifted a sacrifice fly to deep right to extend the lead to 5-3.
The series concludes Sunday with a 2 p.m. first pitch at Husky Field.
