Baseball | 3/29/2015 8:33:00 PM
Box Score BEAUMONT – A flu-stricken ACU baseball team used the backend of its bullpen for all nine innings Sunday to lead the Wildcats to a 5-4 win over Lamar in a non-conference game at Vincent-Beck Stadium.
The win pushes the Wildcats to 6-18 overall, while Lamar falls to 13-14. ACU will be back in action Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. when it takes on nationally ranked Dallas Baptist in a non-conference game that will be broadcast on 98.1 FM The Ticket.
The Wildcats were set to send senior righthander
Thomas Altimont – the reigning Southland Conference Pitcher of the Week – the mound, but he got sick about 10 minutes and head coach
Britt Bonneau went to closer
Kevin Sheets as Sunday's starter.
Sheets went four innings, allowing five hits and two earned runs, but was pulled because he also got sick. Bonneau then went to
Ladgie Zotyka – who normally gets the seventh and / or eighth innings – and he went three innings, allowing just one hit and two runs (one unearned) while walking two and striking out three batters.
That led to
Nick Palacios throwing the final two innings of the game, and he gave up just three hits and no runs. Those three pitchers normally finish up games for the Wildcats, but were pressed into duty because of the run of illness on the team.
With the game tied 4-4 in the seventh,
Tyler Eager led off the top half of the inning with a single to center field and went to second when
Russell Crippen was hit by a pitch. Both runners moved into scoring position on a sacrifice bunt by
Alex Copeland, and Eager came home on an RBI single to left field by
Marcelle Carter.
Lamar went down in order in the bottom of the seventh against Zotyka – who picked up the win – and got runners on the corners with two outs in the eighth before Palacios forced a groundout to end the inning. In the ninth, Palacios worked around a leadoff single to close out the win and earn his first save of the season.
ACU pounded out 13 hits against four Lamar pitchers, led by shortstop
Kyle Carroll, who was 3 for 5 with one run scored. Eager continued his hot start with two hits, three runs scored and one RBI. Carter had a big afternoon, finishing 2 for 5 with three RBI.
