Ball State University Athletics
Ball State University
UAB
Baseball Suffers 6-5 Loss to UAB in Series Finale
February 28, 2010 | Baseball
On a beautiful sunny day in Birmingham, Ala., Ball State's baseball team suffered a 6-5 loss to UAB. With the loss, the Cardinals fall to 2-5 overall, while the Blazers improved to 3-2 on the season.
After Kolbrin Vitek pitched five innings, allowing only one earned run, while striking out three, the Cardinals bullpen was not as effective, and walked eight batters as the Blazers managed five runs off the relievers.
Vitek also did his part offensively with a 2-for-4 day at the plate, including a solo homerun in the top of the ninth that pulled Ball State within the final 6-5 margin.
Ball State came out ready to play after a one hour delay due to umpire issues, and rallied for two runs in the top of the first. A pair of singles by Ryan Chenoweth and Vitek combined with a pair of errors on the UAB leftfielder and a sacrifice fly by Zach Dygert gave Ball State its first run of the game. Ian Nielsen singled to score Vitek and the Cardinals were ahead 2-0.
After allowing one Blazers run in the bottom of the second, Ball State added to its 2-1 lead with one run in the top half of the third. Again, singles told the story for the Cardinals as Nielsen, Stephen Claypool and T.J. Baumet each singled in the inning with Baumet's one bagger scoring Nielsen to give Ball State a 3-1 lead.
With the Cardinals still holding a 3-1 advantage after four innings, Kory Benbow led off the top half of the fifth with a solo homerun over the leftfield wall, his second HR of the season to put Ball State ahead 4-1.
Ball State weathered a big sixth inning for the Blazers where they scored three runs on three singles and two walks, but left the bases loaded and could only tie the Cardinals at 4-4. UAB loaded the bases again in the seventh, but a diving catch by rightfielder Chenoweth ended the Blazers rally with no runs scored and the game still tied at 4-4.
With Ball State going deep into its bullpen in the eighth, UAB loaded the bases with no outs and tallied two runs in the inning to take a 6-4 lead into the ninth.
Vitek led off the Ball State top of the ninth with a solo homer -- his third of the season -- on the second pitch of the inning to bring the Cardinals within 6-5. However, that is all the Cardinals could muster and UAB took game four of the weekend series to claim a 3-1 edge over Ball State.
Chenoweth was 2-for-3 on the day with two walks and one run scored, while Nielsen added two hits in five at bats with one run scored and one RBI.
The Cardinals will travel to Coastal Carolina for the Caravelle Resort Invitational Friday. Ball State will play Pittsburgh Friday in game one of the event and then face Albany and host Coastal Carolina on Saturday and Sunday.
