ABILENE -- For a team that doesn't hit many home runs, two of the ACU Widlcats' six home wins this season have come courtesy of dramatic extra-inning blasts.
The second of those six came Thursday night when
Heath Beasley led off the bottom of the 12th inning by drilling John Shull's first pitch of the inning deep over the wall in left field to give ACU a 4-3 walk-off win over Incarnate Word in Southland Conference baseball action at Crutcher Scott Field.
Back on April 19, ACU trailed Sam Houston State 2-0 before
Taylor Fajardo's two-out, two-run pinch-hit home run in the bottom of the ninth tied the game, setting the stage for
Kyle Carroll to win it with a home run on the first pitch of the bottom of the 10th inning. ACU had not won a home game since that Sunday afternoon.
The victory pushes the Wildcats to 14-35 on the season and 12-16 in the Southland Conference, while the Cardinals fall to 19-30 and 10-18. The teams will resume the three-game series Friday at 2 p.m. with the season home finale set for 1 p.m. Saturday.
When Beasley dug into the batter's box to lead off the bottom of the 12th inning, Incarnate Word pitchers had retired 20 straight Wildcats after
Tyler Eager's two-run triple in the fifth inning gave ACU a 3-2 lead. Starter Gabe Encina retired the final eight men he faced, reliever Matthew Decker retired all three Wildcats he faced, and Shull retired the first nine men he faced.
But Beasley wasted little time hitting his first career home run, crushing Shull's first pitch of the 12th for a no-doubt, game-winning home run.
"We couldn't quite get to their pitchers for quite a while," Beasley said. "They did an outstanding job against us. I just went up there looking for something out over the plate. I got what I was looking for and I got the barrel of the bat on it and drove it out."
Until that point, Thursday's series opener provided few fireworks as two of the best starting pitchers over a couple of sluggish innings to put the opposing offenses in neutral.
ACU's
Thomas Altimont got out of a first-inning jam by allowing just two runs, and from that point on he was rock solid, retiring 18 of 19 Cardinals between the end of the first and the end of the sixth inning to give ACU's offense a chance. The Wildcats were facing UIW's ace in Gabe Encina, who entered the contest with a 1.99 ERA, and he was dominant early before a walk to
Kyle Carroll in the third led to an RBI single by
Colton Hall to cut the UIW lead to 2-1.
The Wildcats got to Encina in the fifth when, with one out and runners at first and second, Eager tripled to right field to drive in Carroll and Hall to give ACU a 3-2 lead. UIW answered back in the seventh against Altimont when Colton Bessett doubled, went to second on a sacrifice bunt and scored on an RBI single by Aaron Warren to make it 3-3.
The ACU bullpen trio of
Ladgie Zotyka,
Nick Palacios and
Kevin Sheets gave up just one hit and struck out five batters and worked out of a couple of jams to give ACU's offense a chance to win it in extra innings, which is exactly what Beasley did with one swing of the bat.
"Heath came up huge for us," ACU head coach
Britt Bonneau said. "I'm glad he got that first home run and it came at a perfect time for us. That home run gave us a chance to get off to a great start to the weekend and try to end the home season on a positive note by winning the series."
