LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – Early runs for the UALR Trojans led to a 4-0 deficit for Texas State on the road Friday night, and it proved to be too much as the Bobcats closed the gap to just one run before running out of innings. With the 4-3 loss to UALR, the Bobcats drop back to 16-16-1 on the season and 8-5 in Sun Belt Conference play.
 
The Trojans tallied six hits in the first two innings to score four runs, two in each inning. In fact, UALR led an inning off with a hit in four of the first five innings. After the Bobcats found themselves in a 4-0 hole, Texas State started to fight back.
 
In the third inning, Luke Sherley led off with a walk, and Cory Geisler sacrifice bunted him to second base. After a balk, Sherley went to third and scored on a Cedric Vallieres groundout, the first of two RBI on the night for Vallieres, the Bobcat leader in RBI.
 
After that, Lucas Humpal struck out two batters and covered first base on a groundout to put UALR down 1-2-3 in the bottom of the third. The Bobcat bats looked to be carrying the momentum into the fourth when Tanner Hill knocked a home run over the left field walk to bring the deficit to just 4-2. Unfortunately, consecutive fly outs after that ended the opportunity.
 
From there, the Texas State bats went three up and three down in the fifth, sixth and seventh innings before scoring a run in the eighth. The Bobcat defense held UALR without a run in that stretch as well, despite getting into trouble with bases loaded and just one out in the fourth. A strikeout and a groundout ended the threat.
 
In the eighth, Jared Huber led off with a single to right field and advanced to second and third on consecutive groundouts. With two outs, Vallieres legged out a bunt single to score Huber and bring the Bobcats to within just one run.
 
Joe Powell entered the game in relief for the eighth inning and tallied two strikeouts to keep UALR off the board. In the ninth, David Paiz came through with a leadoff single, exactly what Texas State needed. The Bobcats, however, followed with two strikeouts. A walk for Theodore Hoffman gave the Bobcats life with the tying run at second base and the go ahead run at first, but a pop up ended the game with Texas State coming up just short.
 
Vallieres led the team with his hit and two RBI. Hill had the other RBI with his homer, his second of the season. Studdard, Paiz and Huber all tallied hits for the Bobcats in addition to Vallieres and Hill.
 
Texas State will look to even the series with UALR at 2 p.m. Saturday with reigning Sun Belt Conference Pitcher of the Week Scott Grist on the mound for the Bobcats. Sunday, it will be a 1 p.m. first pitch for the finale.