Mercer Falls to Western Carolina in SoCon Championship Finale

Sunday, May 29

Greenville, S.C.

1:02 p.m.

Mercer University

38-22

Western Carolina University

29-29

Western Carolina

Mercer

Mercer Falls to Western Carolina in SoCon Championship Finale

5/29/2016 12:00:00 AM | Baseball

Box Score 1 Box Score 2

GREENVILLE, S.C. – The Mercer University baseball team dropped a doubleheader to Western Carolina, 4-2 and 3-2, on the final day of the Southern Conference Championship at Fluor Field. Mercer finished as the tournament runner-up with a 38-23 overall record.

The Bears placed two players on the SoCon All-Tournament team, as Matt Meeder and Trey Truitt each received recognition. Meeder hit .417 during the tourney, while drawing a team-high eight walks en route to an impressive .650 on-base percentage. Truitt set a SoCon Championship record with three home runs in the opening round of play. He finished with a .429 average and seven RBIs despite missing the final two games due to injury.

GAME 1: WESTERN CAROLINA 4, MERCER 2

HOW IT HAPPENED
Western Carolina jumped on the board first, as Matt Smith's two-out double down the right field line resulted in an early 1-0 lead. The Catamounts tacked on three more runs in the fourth inning, using five hits in the frame to push their lead to 4-0.

Mercer put together four hits in the fourth to cut the deficit in half, 4-2, as Jose Hernandez's single to right plated Charlie Madden and Jackson Ware.

Taylor Lobus kept the Bears in the game with five shutout innings, but the Orange and Black's offense couldn't get anything going as they stranded nine runners in the contest.

Three of those runners left on came in the fifth, as Edgeworth was hit by a pitch and Ryan Hagan and Madden drew walks, but Mercer couldn't come through with a chance to square the score up.

The Catamounts earned a stout performance by starting pitcher Bryan Sammons, who tossed seven innings for the win while scattering eight hits by Mercer. Josh Knies took the loss for Mercer, going 3.2 innings while allowing all four Western Carolina runs.

KEY TO THE GAME
Mercer picked up eight hits in the contest but struggled with runners on, going 3-for-17 at the dish. The result was the Bears' lowest run total of the SoCon Championship.

PLAYER OF THE GAME
Lobus' five-inning effort in relief kept the Bears close until the end, as he stifled the Western Carolina bats for only two hits in the longest outing of his career. The freshman retired 14 of the final 15 batters he faced, while striking out three, the sixth time this season he's reached that mark.

GAME ONE NOTABLES

The Orange and Black drew six walks in the contest, increasing their SoCon single-season record total to 358.
Mercer failed to hit a home run for the first time in the 2016 SoCon Championship.
Madden finished 2-for-3 to record his 13th multiple-hit effort of the year.
Ware notched his second straight multiple-hit performance, finishing 2-for-4 at the plate.
Hunter Bening picked up his 13th multi-hit game of the season, going 2-for-3 while additionally drawing a walk.
Hernandez's two-run single in the fourth handed him his sixth multiple-RBI effort of the season.
Kyle Lewis drew a pair of walks to push his season total to 66 and move into sole possession of second place on the SoCon's single-season walks list.

GAME 2: WESTERN CAROLINA 3, MERCER 2

HOW IT HAPPENED
Mercer struck first in the tournament finale, as Hernandez came through again with a two-out double down the right field line that plated Blaise Lezynski for a 1-0 lead.

The Catamounts grabbed their first lead of the game in the bottom of the sixth, breaking up Ryan Askew's shutout bid with a pair of solo shots for a 2-1 advantage. Askew would bounce back though, retiring the next six batters in a row.

Charlie Madden provided late heroics for the Bears, blasting a solo home run to left-center in the top of the ninth to knot the game 2-2. It was Mercer's first run since the second inning.

After surrendering a leadoff single to Matt Smith in the bottom of the ninth, Askew was replaced by Conard Broom on the mound. Smith would prove to be the eventual game-winning run, as Broom hit Nobu Suzuki with a pitch in a bases-loaded situation to end the contest.

Askew took the loss, while Western Carolina reliever Colton Davis earned the win.

KEY TO THE GAME
In the final game of the SoCon Championship, both teams received stout performances from their starting pitchers, as Askew went eight innings while B.J. Nobles tossed 8.2 for the Catamounts.

Askew struck out three batters in addition to scattering seven hits, while Nobles punched out 10 and allowed only one earned run on Madden's home run.

PLAYER OF THE GAME
Madden's solo home run proved to be the Mercer's biggest hit of the day, as the junior's 11th blast of the year tied the game in the top of the ninth.

GAME TWO NOTABLES

Mercer finished the 2016 SoCon Championship with a 3-2 record. The Bears are now 7-2 in SoCon tournament play since joining the league in 2015.
Mercer concluded the 2016 SoCon Championship with 10 home runs, the most of any team. Lewis and Trey Truitt led the team with three apiece, Hagan added a pair and Ware and Madden had one each.
The Bears' pitching staff allowed only 14 runs in 42 innings, eight of which came in Saturday's 9-8 win over Western Carolina.
Askew went 1-1 in the tournament and tossed 13 complete innings. He allowed only three runs, all coming in Sunday's loss.
Hernandez recorded a hit in each of his first two trips to the plate, tallying his fourth multiple-hit effort of the year. The senior finished the day with three hits and three RBIs.
Madden's solo shot to left center was his first of the tournament and 11th of the season. The catcher also had three hits on the day.
Ware's 2-for-4 performance gave him three consecutive multi-hit games in the tournament and pushed his season total to nine overall.
Broom made his nation-leading 41st appearance of the season when he replaced Askew in the bottom of the ninth.

RECORDS UPDATE
Mercer finished the 2016 season with a 38-23 overall record while Western Carolina improved to 30-29.