By Jason Pugh, Northwestern State Associate Athletic Director for External Relations; featured photo by Chris Reich, NSU Photographic Services
TROY, Alabama – Given a second chance, the Northwestern State baseball team nearly pulled off a stunning comeback Saturday afternoon.
Down seven runs in the eighth inning against No. 24 Troy, the Demons took advantage of a two-out, eighth-inning error to slice the lead to one before eventually falling to the Trojans, 14-12, at Riddle-Pace Field.
“We’re never going to stop fighting, and we’re never going to stop competing and we continue to talk to the guys about how proud we are of that fact,” second-year head coach Chris Bertrand said. “We continue to ask and plead with them to keep that up, because eventually, it’s going to flip and go our way. We talked (Friday) night about having that perspective between competing with great effort and then executing clean baseball. The reason Troy is a team that is ranked and considered one of the best teams in the country is because they take their talent and they consistently perform and execute with that talent.
“We feel like we have a talented ball club, and we’re very skilled and tooled and I’m proud of what we built. We have to start performing more consistently and executing more consistently in all three phases of the game.”
Troy (5-1) led 11-4 with two outs in the eighth inning when Trojan shortstop Peyton Watts failed to cleanly field Samuel Stephenson’s ground ball.
After freshman left-hander Chase Cartron hit Rocco Gump and Clay Jung with pitches to force in a run, Troy went back to the bullpen for Colby Frieda.
On Frieda’s sixth pitch, Daniel Burroway connected on his second home run of the series and his second career grand slam to pull the Demons (2-3) within a run.
The Trojan offense, however, had an answer as it had throughout the game.
Troy scored in six of its eight at-bats and did not permit the Demon pitching staff a shutdown inning.
The last Trojan rally delivered three pivotal eighth-inning runs, aided by the seventh walk issued by six Demon pitchers.
The three-run eighth grew in importance once redshirt sophomore Lathen Buzard drilled his first career home run – a two-run shot – off Frieda with one out in the ninth.
Grady Grogen came in and worked around Troy’s third error of the game to notch the final two outs for his first save of the season.
The Demons’ comeback nearly erased the fourth different multi-run lead for the Trojans, who jumped to a 3-0 lead with a two-out, first-inning rally against Tyler Bryan (0-1).
Down 5-1, Rocco Gump jumpstarted the Demon offense with a two-run, opposite-field home run off Troy starter Noah Edders (2-0).
After Edders and reliever Jay Dill settled in, the Trojans pushed their lead to 8-3 before Samuel Stephenson and Gump delivered back-to-back doubles off Dill in the seventh to start the wild ending to the game.
“We just have to find the way to make the necessary adjustments that allow us to compete more consistently in the strike zone,” Bertrand said. “We played eight innings with them on offense, and we walked the leadoff hitter five times. Seven of the 14 runs they had – fifty percent – came off of walks and HBPs in which we put those runners on base. Against a tremendous team – and Troy is such a great offensive teams – we are giving them and multiplying the number of opportunities they have. That has to stop – where we have to more consistently make our opponents earn that stuff.”
The series concludes at 1:05 p.m. Sunday. The Demons will sent right-hander Trent Hillen (1-0, 4.15) to the mound against Troy left-hander Drew Nelson (1-0, 2.25).
No. 24 Troy 14, Northwestern State 12
NSU 012 000 162 – 12 9 0
Troy 321 020 33x – 14 17 3
W – Noah Edders (2-0). L – Tyler Bryan (0-1). S – Grady Gorgen (1). 2B – NSU, Samuel Stephenson, Rocco Gump. Troy, Brooks Bryan. 3B – Troy, Steven Meier. HR – NSU, Daniel Burroway (3), Gump (1), Lathen Buzard (1). Highlights: NSU, Reese Lipoma 3-6; Gump 2-4, 2B, HR, 3 RBIs. Troy, Meier 3-5, 3B, 2 RBIs; Sean Darnell 5-6, 4 RBIs; Blake Cavill 3-5, 4 RBIs; Mike Bello 2-3, 2 RBIs; Peyton Watts 3-5.
Records: Northwestern State 2-3, Troy 5-1.
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