Owls Top Texas 7-4

Tuesday, April 17

Reckling Park

7:00 PM

Rice University

30-11

Texas

31-11

Texas

Rice Owls

<b>Junior Chris Kelley is listed as Friday's probable starting pitcher.</b>

4/18/2007 12:00:00 AM | Baseball

Box Score

April 18, 2007

Box Score | Highlights video

CSTV: Touching the Bases

HOUSTON -- Junior starting pitcher Chris Kelley scattered four hits and struck out a career-high seven batters and reliever Cole St.Clair closed it out with three hitless innings to lead the sixth-ranked Rice baseball team to a 7-4 victory over the visiting Texas Longhorns Tuesday evening at Reckling Park in Houston.

The Owls jumped on the scoreboard for a run in the bottom of the first inning and chipped away for scores in five of their eight offensive frames. Junior Tyler Henley led off the first by blasting a triple to the wall in center field and he scored on a sacrifice fly by junior Chad Lembeck.

Texas tied the game in the fourth on an RBI ground out by Preston Clark, but Rice came right back with a run in its half of the inning. With one away junior Joe Savery was hit by a pitch and he advanced on a walk to Aaron Luna. Conference USA hitter of the week Jess Buenger punched a hit through the left side to score Savery and the Owls were back in front, 2-1.

In the fifth J.P. Padron and Henley led off with consecutive walks and Lembeck bunted the runners to second and third. Padron scored on a ground ball by Brian Friday and Henley dashed home on a double into left field that stretched the margin to 4-1.

Texas slugger Kyle Russell connected on a pitch for his 21st home run of the season in the sixth to make the score 4-2, but Rice answered with two more runs in the bottom of the frame that made it a 6-2 contest. Padrone knocked a two-out double to the gap in right-center and Henley walked for a second time. Lembeck drove both home with a double to left for his third RBI of the game.

With some offensive support behind him, Kellley was in high gear on the mound. He left with the lead after 6.0 innings having allowed two runs on four hits and a walk. His seven strikeouts, including striking out the side in the third, set a new career-high for the Sugar Land native.

Texas, however, wasn't quite finished and scored a pair of unearned runs off the Rice bullpen in the top of the seventh on a pair of hits and an Owl fielding error. With a runner on third base and no one out in a 6-4 game, Rice went to a new arm out of the bullpen. St.Clair answered the call and proceeded to work out of the jam with a ground out and strikeout. He walked Russell to set up a first and third situation, but an infield pop-up ended the threat.

Savery led off the Rice seventh by slugging a home run over the left field wall. His third round-tripper of the season made the score 7-4. St.Clair retired each of the next six batters in the eighth and ninth for his first save of 2007. He fanned two in his longest outing of the year since returning to the lineup two weeks ago.

Rice won its third game in a row to improve to 31-10 on the season. The Owls snapped a streak of 10-straight losses to the rival Longhorns that dated back to the 2004 season. Texas fell to 31-11 on the year.

The current five-game homestand continues for Rice with a C-USA weekend series against Central Florida starting on Friday (Apr. 20). Start time with UCF is 7 pm in the series-opener, 2 pm in the second game on Saturday and 1 pm in the finale on Sunday. All start times listed are Central time.