Cougars End Tournament Run With Loss to Dyersburg
Cleveland State's Baseball season has come to an end. After a 11-6 loss to No. 1 ranked Walters State on Tuesday, the Cougars were tasked with continuing their tournament run through the loser's bracket. First up for the Cougars was Motlow State, a team they had beaten once out of a three game regular season series.
Against Motlow, the Cougars had Hooper Mills on the mound, who pitched 6 innings, allowing a single earned run, 6 walks while striking out 7. The Cougars wasted no time in getting the game going, taking a 3-0 lead in the top of the 1st inning thanks to a Logan Peterson sacrifice fly, Brandon Mason scoring on a fielder's choice and a Cameron Payne RBI single. The runs kept coming for Cleveland State, as they added 3 more runs between the 2nd and 4th innings. Hunter Oliver singled scoring Brandon Mason and Noah Hill while Joey Roberson scored Logan Peterson off an RBI double. The Bucks finally put some runs on the board in the 4th inning, scoring their only 2 runs of the game. However, Cleveland State's momtemum kept on rolling as they scored four runs in the top of the 6th inning. Trey Vanderpool smacked an RBI double which scored Joey Roberson and Logan Peterson. Caleb Collins singled, Trey Vanderpool advanced to third base and scored off an error by the Motlow State pitcher, Rhett Baldwin scored as well, pushing the score to a 10-2 Cleveland State lead.
Brock Browning then entered the game for the Cougars, throwing an outstanding 3 inning, 1 walk, 0 earned run, 5 strikeout performance to close out the win. In what was the best game of the tournament offensively for the Cougars, Cleveland State totalled 16 hits, 9 RBI's while drawing 4 walks.
The win against Motlow gave Cleveland State a match up against Dyersburg State, their previous first round opponent. The Cougars defeated Dyersburg back in round one by a score of 7-6. Unfortunately, the Eagles got their revenge as they knocked Cleveland State out of the tournament with a 10-6 final score.
Ryan Inches was the starter against Dyersburg and pitched 4.2 innings, allowing 7 earned runs, 2 walks while striking out 3. Jared McDonald, Justin Coleman and Noah Peterson all made relief appearances in the game, combining for 3 earned runs, 4 walks while striking out 4.
Dyersburg State had complete control of the game through the 6th inning, as they had pushed their lead to a 9-0 total versus the Cougars. Cleveland State took back control in the 7th and 8th innings, scoring 6 runs of their won to make it a 9-6 total. It wasn't enough however as the Eagles scored one more run of their own to eventually end the game with a 10-6 final. Noah Hill and Logan Peterson each finished the game with a double while Trey Martin and Cameron Payne each tallied 2 RBI's. In total, the Cougars had 6 runs scored on 5 hits with 4 RBI's and 3 walks. Ryan Inches took the loss on the mound and the Cougars season came to an end.
