MEMPHIS, Tenn. – The Lee baseball team rode the solid relief work of Jax Howard and Tim Gooden plus big days at the plate from Riley Black and Cam Suto to a 7-3 victory over host Christian Brothers University on Sunday afternoon at Nadicksbernd Field to claim the three-game series (2-1).
"We have a goal of winning series every weekend and we accomplished that. We have one more big weekend and winning the series will be the goal again," pointed out Lee head coach Mark Brew after Sunday's victory.
Lee improves to an all-important 14-13 in league standings and 25-20 overall. It also sets up a final weekend series matchup against rival Shorter University. In a battle for sixth place in the standings, the Hawks are 14-12, Delta State 12-14 and West Alabama 12-15. Delta State closes out its regular season at Mississippi College and West Alabama will host Union University.
"I like the toughness our bullpen exhibited today. Jax (Howard) and Timmy (Gooden) did an excellent job out of the pen with 6+ innings of shutout ball," added Coach Brew. Howard worked 4.1 innings in relief of starter Frankie Volkers and got credit for his first win of the year. The hard-throwing right-hander allowed three hits, no earned runs and struck out five. Gooden pitched the final two innings. He also did not surrender a run while walking a pair and fanning two.
"Cam (Suto) and Riley (Black) had big games at the plate and Malachi (Cloud) had a huge weekend," noted the Lee coach. Suto went 4-for-5 with a pair of RBI. He had a double and also scored a run. Black capped off a big weekend with three hits in three trips to the dish. He blasted his third homer of the weekend and now has nine for the year. Just for good measure he tripled and knocked in three runs.
Cloud raised his average to .437 on the year. This past weekend he had nine hits, three homeruns, drove home five runs and stole four bases. For the year the surging freshman has nine round-trippers, eight doubles and a .510 on-base percentage. He has also stolen 22 bases in 24 attempts.
The Flames wasted no time in grabbing the lead on Sunday afternoon. In the top of the first Dylan Standifer singled, Suto began his big day with a double that drove home Standifer. Cloud followed with a run-scored single and tallied when Black tripled to left centerfield.
The Bucs tied the game in the third before Lee scored single runs in the sixth and seventh to go on top 5-3. The run in the sixth was scored without a hit. Both Brandon Daniels and Cloud were hit by pitches. Daniels advanced to third on a wild pitch and scored on a RBI sac fly by Black. In the seventh Noah Hattier had a one-base hit with one out. He advanced to second on a wild pitch and scored on Suto's one-base knock.
Two big insurance runs went upon the board in the eighth. Black blasted a homer, Josiah Miller was hit by a pitch and Luke Hughes singled, advancing Miller to third. Another wild pitch by the Bucs hurlers allowed Lee to score its seventh and final run of the game.
Charlie Farro (3-5) was the starting and losing CBU pitcher. He worked six innings and allowed four earned runs. Travis Cole and Zach Sutton came on in relief. Clay Facteau homered and had two hits for the Bucs. He also drove in two runs. Matthew McDaniel also had a pair of singles and an RBI.
