FROSTBURG, Md. – The eighth-ranked Frostburg State baseball won its eighth-straight game with a 5-1 Capital Athletic Conference victory over Southern Virginia, Wednesday afternoon.
The Bobcats improved to 20-2 on the year and 11-1 in the conference while the Knights dropped to 5-11 on the season and 4-6 in the CAC.
Both the Bobcat and Knights bats were held quiet over the first three innings before FSU broke the scoreless tie in the fourth. Senior Nick Walker lined a ball to deep left center to lead off the inning with his third triple of the year and came home on senior Ricky Brady's single through the right side. Southern Virginia's pitcher, Chris Madison, got himself out of the inning sitting down the next three Bobcats and FSU led 1-0 after four.
SVU got the run back in the top of the sixth to tie the game at 1-1. Luke Smith singled through the right side and was moved to second on a sacrifice bunt from CJ Andrus. Masen Fenn singled him home to tie the game but sophomore Ryan Callahan got an inning-ending double play thanks to smooth fielding at first by Brady.
Walker broke the tie with one swing of the bat in the bottom of the sixth as he took a 1-0 pitch over the left field fence with senior Zach Weiss on first to give FSU a 3-1 lead.
Junior Nick Huff came out in relief of Callahan in the seventh and set the Knights down in order in both the seventh and eighth innings to preserve the two-run lead.
Frostburg tacked on two more runs in the eighth to give the Bobcats a comfortable 5-1 lead. After drawing a five-pitch walk and chasing the Knights' starting pitcher, Weiss advanced to third on a wild pitch that went all the way back to the fence behind home plate. Walker followed with a walk of his own before Brady doubled to left center to easily score Weiss and Walker.
Huff got the first two Knights out in the top of the ninth before giving up a single and a walk to put two runners on. Senior Ricky Castro scooped up a softly hit ball in his direction to throw out Tanner Wilde and end the game for Frostburg.
Callahan earned his second win of the year on the mound for Frostburg, allowing just three hits over 6.0 innings and one earned run while striking out four. Huff earned his second save of the year after tossing 3.0 scoreless innings and allowing just one hit and one walk and striking out four.
Madison suffered the loss for SVU as he went 7.1 innings and allowed four runs, all earned, on eight hits and struck out six.
Brady led the Bobcats at the plate going 3-for-4 with three RBI while Walker went 2-for-3 with two RBI and three runs scored for FSU.
The Bobcats return to Bob Wells Field tomorrow to host Marymount (Va.) in a CAC match up at 3:00 pm.