Baseball Beats Butler; Heads to EMU Friday

Wednesday, April 15

Muncie, Ind.

3:00 PM

Ball State University

23-12

Butler

13-22

Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	Runs R	Hits H	Errors E
Butler	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	1	2	13	3
Ball State Cardinals	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	2	3	10	0

Baseball Suffers 11-7 Loss at Kent State

April 15, 2015 | Baseball

Box Score

By: Ball State Athletics

In a game that came down to a two-out, ninth inning rally, Ball State's baseball team pulled out a 3-2 win over Butler Wednesday to improve to 23-12 on the season.

With two outs in the ninth, Scott Tyler reached first on an error by Butler's second baseman to get things started. Zach Plesac, who entered the game as a pinch hitter, singled to right field and Jarrett James, who was pinch running for Tyler, advanced to third. With runners on the corners, Matt Eppers' grounder to third was misplayed by Butler and James scored the tying run, while Plesac advanced to third. Ryan Spaulding stepped to the plate and his infield, high hopper single to third base scored Plesac for the winning run.

The Cardinals used four pitchers with Brendan Burns finishing the game for the win and improving to 4-1 on the season. Burns threw the final two innings, allowing one earned run and striking out two. Mitch Gibson made his first career start in the contest and went 5.1 innings, allowing only one earned run and striking out one. David Current and Devin Wilburn completed two innings in the middle of the game.

Ball State scored the first run of the game in the fourth inning when Alex Call singled up the middle to lead off and stole second. Jarett Rindfleisch walked to put runners on first and second, and an Elbert Devarie ground out moved them to first and second. With one out, Colin Brockhouse hit a sacrifice fly to left to give the Cardinals a 1-0 lead through four.

Butler tied the game with one run in the fifth and then scored one in the ninth to take a 2-1 lead before the Cardinals' ninth-inning rally.

Call was 3-for-4 on the day with one run scored, while Devarie was 2-for 4 in the contest.

Butler stranded 12 runners on base in a game full of singles, while the Cardinals stranded nine in the contest.

Ball State will return to Mid-American Conference action Friday when it takes its 8-4 league record to Eastern Michigan for a three-game series.