May 22, 2010

Final Stats

SAN MARCOS - Senior Garret Carruth picked up his fifth win of the season and led the Texas State baseball team in a too close for comfort 8-6 victory Saturday afternoon to close out the 2010 regular season and claim its second-straight Southland Conference Championship. The Bobcats will enter the league's postseason tournament as the No. 1 seed with a 34-20 overall record and a 23-10 mark in the SLC.

Carruth, along with Shaun Garcia, Jordan Kopycinski, Kyle Livingstone, Laurn Randell and Michael Russo were all honored in a pregame ceremony by head coach Ty Harrington. The six guys proceeded to lead the charge against the Mavericks. With runners on scoring position in the bottom of the first, Livingstone slammed a base hit to right field to score Atwood to give Texas State the early.

UTA chased the Bobcats with a solo home run deep to left field from Jordan Vaughn in the next frame, forcing Texas State to come through at the plate. Texas State was on the verge of coming through after an infield error allowed Clint Vest to reach base and a follow-up ground rule double by Laurn Randell set the team up to take the lead, but Logan Bawcom retired the next two batters to end the threat. The right-hander couldn't hold off for long, because in the bottom of the fifth, Kyle Kubitza launched his tenth home run of the season to deep right center to put the Bobcats up 2-1.

The Mavericks came right back at Texas State, catching the team off guard, to tied the game. A leadoff single and a walk put the foe in scoring position, but Bobcat starter Mitchell Pitts got Vaughn to fly out and retired Michael Choice on strikes with three pitches to get through what seemed to be the toughest part of UTA's lineup. However, Preston Beck used his at-bat to put a single into right field to send across the tying run and Stephan Guest mimicked the feat with to give the Mavericks a 3-2 lead.

In fighting form, Texas State came back with a RBI single from Bret Atwood to tie the game and scoreless seventh inning kept Saturday's 701 fans on edge.

Garret Carruth came in for sound relief and shut down UTA's heart of the line up in order to give Texas State another chance to take the game. An infield error by the Mavericks put Tyler Sibley on base and a sacrifice fly shifted the sophomore to second base. Brian Watson (2-3) intentionally walked Kubitza and in the next at-bat tossed a wild pitch to Livingstone to shift runners and force a second intentional walk to load the bases.

Jason Martinson came through with base hit through the right side to drive in two runs and back-to-back singles followed to give Texas State an 8-4 edge.

In the ninth, a leadoff homer trimmed the gap and an error with two outs allowed two unearned runs to score, but Carson Smith got Choice to ground out to Livingstone at first base and hand the Bobcats the series victory over UTA. Atwood led the team with three hits and one RBI. Texas State totaled 12 hits on the afternoon, three of which came in the game deciding eighth inning.

The Bobcats will look to solidify their spot in the NCAA Tournament this week at the Southland Conference Tournament.