Box Score MONROE, La. – After winning in convincing fashion Friday night, 12-5, over UL Monroe, the Bobcats looked poised to sweep the series. However, 10 errors combined in the Saturday and Sunday games doomed the Bobcats. They fell to ULM, 17-12, Saturday night and dropped the Sunday finale, 7-6, giving up three unearned runs on three errors.
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The loss drops Texas State to 19-16 on the season and 8-7 in Sun Belt Conference play while the Warhawks improve to 16-22 on the year and 7-8 in the SBC.
Texas State knocked 16 base hits that led to 12 runs in each of the first two games of the series, and the bats kept going in the finale as the Bobcats racked up seven hits. Most of them came from three players.
Colby Targun,
Garrett Mattlage and
Cory Geisler, who saw double duty as a designated hitter and relief pitcher Sunday, each had two hits apiece. The Warhawks helped the Bobcats out a bit with two errors of their own, leading to four unearned runs for Texas State.
Lucas Humpal went 5.2 innings striking out four and walking two. He gave up four earned runs on eight hits.
Dylan Bein and Geisler finished off the final 2.1 innings. Bein struck out one and only gave up one hit in two innings of work. Geisler did not give up a hit and neither gave up a run.
The Bobcats struck first in the game with two runs in the third inning.
Tanner Hill led off the inning with a walk and went to second on a groundout. He scored on a single from Targun. Targun came in on a double from Mattlage for the early 2-0 lead. Texas State added one more in the fourth when
Ben McElroy reached on an error, went to second on a single, third on a sacrifice bunt and scored on a sacrifice flyout from Hill.
In the bottom of the fourth, though, ULM tallied three runs on two errors and three hits to tie the game. Texas State, however, bounced back with three runs in the top of the fifth to reclaim a lead and push it to 6-3.
Matt Smith led off the inning when he reached on a two-base error. He went to third on a groundout, and, after a Mattlage walk, scored on a single from
Granger Studdard. Mattlage scored on a McElroy groundout and Studdard came in on a Geisler hit. Geisler finished the weekend 9-for-13 for a .692 average on the weekend.
Those would be the last runs Texas State would score while ULM racked up four runs in the bottom of the sixth on four hits, a walk and a hit by pitch. Neither team could produce much after that with both teams only putting two baserunners on base the rest of the way.
The Bobcats will travel to play at UTSA at 6 p.m. Tuesday before hosting Georgia State in another SBC series over Easter Weekend.
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