'Roos Drop Pair to Centenary

SHERMAN, Texas – The Austin College baseball team fell in both halves of its Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference-opening doubleheader on Saturday at Baker Field, falling 14-7 in game one and 20-5 in game two. The 'Roos are now 4-8 overall and 0-2 in conference play. 

Centenary jumped out to huge leads in both games, starting off by going up 9-0 in the top of the first in game one. The 'Roos settled down defensively after that, slowly starting to chip away at the margin. Austin College plated two runs in the bottom half of the first, first on a throwing error and then a balk, and added another run aided by an error in the third to make it 9-3.

However, Centenary plated a run in the fourth and added two more in the sixth to go on top 12-3, but Oscar Gonzalez scored on a balk and James Wyche managed to steal home in the seventh to trim it to a 12-5 game. Two more runs would come across in the eighth for Centenary as the Gents extended the lead to 14-5, and Austin College would get two runs back on a Cody Goggins RBI single and another run via error to make it 14-7 but that's how things would end.

Collin Maynard took the loss, surrendering seven runs on four hits in a third of an inning. Brett Taff went 2-for-3 with three runs scored, and Goggins finished 2-for-4 at the dish. 

In game two, the Gents exploded for 10 runs in the first inning, highlighted by a two-run homer from Cody Crowder, and the lead grew to 13-0 with three more runs in the third. Austin College got on the board in the bottom of the third on an RBI single by Gonzalez, but the lead would grow to 16-1 in the fifth. Taff singled home a pair of runs to make it 16-3, but another Centenary homer in the sixth and three more runs in the seventh pushed it to a 20-3 game. Taff would add a two-run double in the seventh to make it 20-5, and that's how things would end. 

Christian Thomas absorbed the loss for Austin College, giving up eight runs on four hits in 0.2 innings pitched, and Taff went 2-for-3 once again, driving in four runs. Michael Winterrowd added a 2-for-3 performance at the plate.

Austin College will be looking to bounce back as they close out the series against the Gents with first pitch scheduled for 1:00 p.m. tomorrow. 

Austin College athletic teams participate as a member of the NCAA Division III and the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference.