Wildcats power past Javelinas

Friday, February 19

Kingsville, TX

3:00 pm

Abilene Christian

Texas A&M - Kingsville

2/19/2010 9:24:07 PM | Baseball

KINGSVILLE -- Ian Tomkins drove in six runs Friday night as No. 10 ACU powered past Texas A&M-Kingsville, 12-6, in the opening game of a four-game Lone Star Conference baseball series at Nolan Ryan Field.

The win pushes the Wildcats to 8-1 overall and 4-1 in the LSC, while the Javelinas fall to 6-3 and 2-3. The two teams will continue the series Saturday with a 1 p.m. doubleheader before wrapping up the series with a single game Sunday at noon.

ACU jumped on top with three runs in the second and two more in the fifth and never trailed en route to taking the victory. Cameron Aspaas worked a solid 5 1/3 innings to pick up the win, running his record to 2-0 on the season. Brad Rutherford came into the game in the seventh and worked two innings, striking out five of the six batters he faced.

Kingsville was able to push four runs across the plate in the bottom of the ninth, but by then the Wildcats had put 12 runs on the board to essentially put the game away.

Tomkins had a big hand in the Wildcats' five-run ninth inning that sealed the win as he blasted a two-out grand slam over the wall in left-center, plating Bret Bochsler, Clint Bowker and Travis Latz in front of him and pushing ACU's lead to 12-2.

ACU got on the board early, scoring three runs in the second with two of them coming in on a Tomkins single down the left field line. Chris Hall then plated Tomkins with the third run of the inning with an RBI single to left field.

ACU scored two more runs in the third when Cameron Watten singled with two outs. Bowker followed with a double to right and Watten moved to third and then scored on a throwing error by the right fielder. Bochsler then singled up the middle to score Bowker, making it 5-0.

The Wildcats tacked on two more runs in the seventh on Will Calhoun's two-run home run. That set the stage for the Wildcats' five-run ninth inning that put the game away.