Belton, Texas – The University of Mary Hardin-Baylor baseball team jumped out to a 7-0 first inning lead and never looked back as the Cru rolled to a 12-8 victory over Blackburn College Tuesday night in Belton. UMHB improves to 6-8 on the season with its third straight win. The Beavers fall to 1-5 with the loss.
Mark Frankhouser blasted a two-run homer for the first runs of the game for the Cru and his first collegiate home run. Ty Johnson added an RBI single, Robbie Gillen drew a bases loaded walk, Dakota Best singled home a pair of runs and Frankhouser closed out the first inning scoring with an RBI single. Blackburn put two runs up in the top of the second, but Caleb Davis' sacrifice fly and a run-scoring wild pitch helped UMHB answer in the bottom of that frame. The Beavers scored four runs in the top of the third to cut the lead to 9-6. The Cru again answered with two runs in the bottom of the inning. Frankhouser doubled home a run and scored on Landon Dieterich's RBI single to make it 11-6. Both teams scored runs in the fourth, with Gillen scoring on a passed ball. The pitching staffs took over from there as both teams went scoreless until Blackburn added a single run in the top of the ninth to cut it to the final margin.
Frankhouser finished with three hits and four RBI to lead the Cru offense. Austin Blanford also had three hits and Best, Dieterich and Johnson added two hits apiece. Braden McMahan (1-0) picked up his first collegiate win for UMHB with four and two-thirds innings of four-hit relief work. Jake Lochhead took the loss for Blackburn to fall to 0-2 on the season. Four players had two hits apiece in the Beavers' 11-hit attack. UMHB finished with 13 hits and drew ten walks in the contest.
The Cru will travel to Austin for a three-game conference series with American Southwest Conference co-leader Concordia Texas this weekend. That series opens with a 7:00 PM single game on Friday.