ACU, Texans battle to split
4/25/2009 3:00:00 AM | Baseball
STEPHENVILLE -- Preston Vancil struck out 13 batters and gave up just one run in an outstanding complete-game performance Friday night that helped the No. 17 ACU Wildcats salvage a doubleheader split with Tarleton State in a Lone Star Conference baseball series at the Cecil Ballow Complex.
After dropping the first game, 3-2 in eight innings, the Wildcats bounced back to win the nightcap, 7-1, behind Vancil's performance and a six-run first inning.
The win pushes the Wildcats to 38-16 overall and 29-13 in the LSC, while the Texans fall to 24-27 and 21-20-1. ACU is one game behind Cameron (30-12 in the LSC) going into Saturday's final day of the regular season and needs a sweep of Tarleton and a Southwestern Oklahoma State sweep of Cameron to earn the No. 1 seed for next weekend's LSC Baseball Championship. Anything else and Cameron will be the No. 1 seed in the tournament.
The Wildcats lost a heartbreaker in the opening game of the doubleheader when Thomas de Angelis scored on a bases-loaded wild pitch by Andrew Yacek to give the Texans a 3-2 victory.
ACU, though, wasted little time taking out its frustration on the Texans, exploding for six runs on six hits in the first inning, three of them home runs over the short fence in left field.
With one out in the first, Davis Page doubled to right-centerfield and then scored on a Jordan Schmitt two-run home run to left field. Travis Latz followed with a solo homer to make it 3-0.
Willie Uechi and Thomas Bumpass then delivered back-to-back singles before Cameron Watten popped out for the second out of the inning. But Brett Bochsler kept the inning going with a three-run oppopsite-field home run to left field to make it 6-0.
Those six runs were more than enough for Vancil, who went the distance to improve to 3-4 on the season. He allowed a solo home run to Charlie Ulbricht in the third inning, but that was all the offense the Texans could muster against ACU's big righthander.
In the first game, Watten and Schmitt each drove in runs for the Wildcats, but those two runs were all ACU could get against Texan pitchers Austin Neal and Scott Crook.
In the bottom of the eighth, Yacek began the eight by giving up a walk in front of a sacrifice bunt. He then intentionally walked Chris Casazza before giving up a single to Cy Williams to load the bases. But while pitching to Aaron Dalton, Yacek uncorked a wild pitch that allowed deAngelis to scamper home with the game-winning run.
