Eagles Fall in Series Finale to Elon
4/28/2013 9:10:55 PM | Baseball
Box Score | Video: Post Game with Coach Hennon
STATESBORO, Ga. - Kyle Webb tossed a complete game and held the Georgia Southern Eagles to one run as the Elon Phoenix salvaged a game in the three-game Southern Conference series with a 9-1 victory on Sunday.
Georgia Southern (23-20, 12-12 SoCon) tallied nine hits, but Webb did not allow any walks and only two Eagles reached base without the benefit of a base hit.
Webb (5-2) struck out 11 batters to earn his fifth win of the season. The righthander surrendered eights hits over the first five innings but settled in to allow only three base runners over the final four innings.
“Webb gave them a great effort today. I thought we had some good at-bats early against him and had some opportunities with some men on base but were unable to deliver the big hit,” said Head Coach Rodney Hennon. “He was able to pitch out of a couple of jams early and they were able to get him some runs. Defensively we hurt ourselves today with some mistakes that led to some big innings. You give a guy like that a lot of runs to work with and he can be awfully tough on you.”
Elon (23-23, 15-9 SoCon) scored all nine of their runs in the middle three innings to erase an early GSU lead. The Eagles started the scoring with a two-out RBI single by Ben Morgan in the second inning before the Phoenix struck for three runs in the fourth inning.
Starter Matt McCall (3-1) allowed five runs over four innings and was suffered his first loss of the season. McCall gave up seven hits and two walks while striking out four batters over his 89 pitches.
Elon sent 10 batters to the plate in the fifth inning and scored four runs to extend their lead to 7-1. McCall walked Casey Jones to start the inning and he scored the first run on a wild pitch. Antonio Alvarez tallied two of his three RBIs on the day with a double, and Chris Bresnahan drove in the fourth run on a single.
The Phoenix plated their final two runs in the sixth inning on an Alex Swim home run. Swim lifted a 1-0 pitch over the left field fence for his first long ball of the season.
Clint Taylor came on in relief in the seventh inning and held Elon scoreless for the final three frames. Taylor allowed a lead off single in the seventh inning but got Ryan Kinsella to ground into a double play. He worked around a pair of two-out hits in the ninth inning and struck out Kinsella to end the inning.
Georgia Southern returns to action Tuesday at North Florida. The trip to Jacksonville will be the first of two mid-week contests. The Eagles will also host Charleston Southern on Wednesday. Both games can be heard on the Georgia Southern Radio Network and online at gseagles.com/watch-listen.
Georgia Southern Athletics provides up-to-date information on all its sports through its official website, GSEagles.com, through social media channels facebook.com/GSAthletics and twitter.com/GSAthletics, and its new "Eagles GATA" mobile app for Android and iOS.
