| BOCA RATON, Fla. – Indiana State took the second game in the series over No. 20 Florida Atlantic University baseball, scoring their first eight runs of the game with two outs, and stymying the FAU bats on Friday night. Quotable Head Coach John McCormack: “(The morale) is fine, the guys are great. They’ve all played baseball a long time, and this happens. They supported each other, and again, we’ve just got to figure out a way (to get out) of these prolonged innings. There’s two outs with two strikes, and they end up scoring six runs. And we mix an error in there, which could’ve kept it to two or three runs. Gotta figure out a way to extract ourselves from that.” The Beginning/The Turning Point After a scoreless opening inning, ISU (9-4) had a runner at first, two outs, and were facing an 0-2 count. A hit batter on the next pitch extended the inning, back-to-back singles made it 2-0, and an error scored another run. After a pitching change, two more two-out hits ballooned it to a six-run frame. The Finish The Owls’ (8-5) bullpen settled down, as after the Sycamores scored two in the fourth, three arms combined to retire 10 in a row. The only other scoring came in the eighth, on both sides. ISU had a two-run homer in the top half; FAU answered with one of their own, a Shane Magrann line drive that cleared the rightfield fence for his first Owl home run. The Arms Jacob Josey (0-1) returned and was the victim of the two-out rally in the second Dante Visconti faced six batters and retired them all, in the fifth and sixth. He struck out three and was economical, with 17 of his 23 pitches for strikesNicholas Del Prado followed and had a 1-2-3 seventh; Jack Stroud threw a scoreless ninth The Bats Magrann’s blast was the Owls’ first by a pinch-hitter since Jared DeSantolo on April 17, 2018He knocked in Wilfredo Alvarez, scoring his team-high 18th run of the yearA 2-for-4 showing is the fourth straight multi-hit game for Alvarez. He’s hitting 9-for-15 in that span, a .600 batting averageNolan Schanuel also had two hits on the night What’s Next Saturday’s 1 p.m. finale against the Sycamores has reached capacity. For future home games, purchase tickets on FAU’s baseball tickets website or by calling 1-866-FAU-OWLS. |
