EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. -- The middle innings proved to be the downfall for the Missouri S&T baseball team Friday night as Southern Illinois Edwardsville scored 10 runs in a three-inning span to win the opening game of the four-game series by the score of 10-6.
Friday's loss drops the Miners to 14-15 in Great Lakes Valley Conference play and means that S&T will have to win all three remaining games in the series to have any chance to qualify for the conference tournament. The Miners are currently two games behind both SIUE and Drury for the last guaranteed playoff spot in the GLVC West.
The Miners got out to a 4-0 lead after 4 1/2 innings, scoring twice in the first inning on a two-run homer by Zac Carter. S&T added to its lead with a run in the third when Thomas McCormick singled home Andrew Vance and again in the fifth when Carter and McCormick had back-to-back doubles.
However, the Cougars got on the scoreboard in the fifth when an error allowed the first run to score, then Cory Bunner's RBI single trimmed the lead to 4-2. SIUE took the lead an inning later when Steve Doll belted a three-run homer off S&T starter Matt Campbell.
After the Miners missed a scoring chance in the seventh when the first two hitters reached base, the Cougars broke the game open with a five-run seventh.
S&T got two runs in the ninth, the first coming when McCormick doubled in Gerad Fox to break the Miners' single-season RBI record with his 46th run batted in of the season. McCormick has driven in at least one run in in 17 of the Miners' last 18 games. He had three hits in the game as did Carter.
Yaimel Javier-Cury also drove in a run in the ninth with a double.
S&T and SIUE will play a doubleheader Saturday starting at noon, then wrap up the series with a single game on Sunday.
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