Owls Clip East Carolina In 10 Innings, 5-4

Saturday, April 19

Reckling Park

7:00 PM

Rice University

30-10, 12-2

East Carolina

27-12, 8-6

East Carolina

Rice

Owls Clip East Carolina In 10 Innings, 5-4

4/19/2008 12:00:00 AM | Baseball

Box Score

April 19, 2008

Box Score | Highlights

Rice Baseball Team Defeats East Carolina 5-4 In 10 Innings For Tenth-Straight Win Owls Win Extra Inning Game On Bases-Loaded Walk; C-USA Series Concludes Sunday At 1 PM

HOUSTON -- With no shortage of drama for the 2,921 fans in attendance and the game's television audience, freshman Chad Mozingo drew a walk with the bases loaded in the bottom of the tenth inning to force across the winning run and lift the Rice baseball team to a 5-4 victory over visiting East Carolina in the second game of a three-game Conference USA series Saturday evening at Reckling Park.

The Owls, now 30-10 on the season and leading C-USA with a 12-2 league record, posted their tenth win in a row on CBS College Sports' television broadcast of the game. Rice will next attempt to go for the sweep of the weekend series in a 1 pm game Sunday at Reckling Park.

After leaving the bases loaded and not scoring a run in the bottom of the eighth, Rice might have had a case of deja' vu in the tenth. Diego Seastrunk doubled to left-center to start the extra-inning rally and with first base open, East Carolina elected to intentionally walk slugger Aaron Luna. Rick Hague executed a textbook sacrifice bunt to advance the runners and with first base open yet again, the Pirates rolled the bones to intentionally walk Adam Zornes.

Mozingo had flown out to short right-center field in almost the same, one-out and bases-loaded situation just two innings before. A foul and a called strike put him behind in the count, but this time the rookie from Spring, Tex., showed improved discipline at the plate to work the count back full and then by laying-off eventual ball four. Seastrunk was forced home and the Owls were in the win column with a 5-4 final. It was the fourth time this season for the Owls to record a "walk-off victory" in the team's final home at bat.

It was ECU that quickly turned three-consecutive hits into a run in the top of the first inning. Ryan Woods, Stephen Batts and Corey Kemp did the damage with one out to give the Pirates their first lead of the series, 1-0.

The Owls came right back with four runs in its half of the frame. Jared Gayhart singled to center and stole second to move into scoring position. J.P. Padron laced a come-backer through the middle of the infield and Gayhart sprinted home. Luna singled into the hole at shortstop to put two men on base and the hot-hitting Zornes made the most of the RBI opportunity. The Owls' junior catcher blasted his team-leading eighth home run of the season over the wall in centerfield to make the score 4-1.

ECU rallied to tie the game in the middle innings. In the fifth Harrison Eldridge doubled to right and scored on a base hit by Wood. A single and walk then loaded the bases before Wood was able to score on a ground out to the right side to cut the lead to 4-3. In the sixth Dustin Harrington singled and advanced to third on a base hit by Trent Whitehead. Harrington scored on Wood's sacrifice fly to tie the game, 4-4.

The Pirates put a man in scoring position in both the eighth and ninth, but reliever Cole St.Clair worked out both jams. The senior left-hander from Santa Ana, Calif., fired 2.1 scoreless innings to earn his sixth win of the season. He allowed just one hits with no walks while striking out two. Matt Evers was also sound and solid with 2.2 innings in relief where he allowed just one hit with no walks while striking out three.

East Carolina finished the game with a total of 14 hits. The Pirates are now 27-12 overall and 8-6 in C-USA.