UT Arlington Hands Eagles a 12-5 Defeat in Sun Belt Opener

Friday, March 15

Arlington, Texas

7:30 p.m. (ET)

Georgia Southern University

7-9, 0

UT Arlington

12-6, 0

Georgia Southern

UT Arlington

3/15/2019 10:45:00 PM | Baseball

Box Score

Eagles will look to even the series on Saturday at 3 p.m. (ET) / 2 p.m. (CT)

ARLINGTON, TEXAS - Georgia Southern Baseball was no match for UT Arlington on Friday night in the series opener, dropping the 12-5 decision. The Eagles trailed 8-1 after six and cut the lead to 8-5, before the Mavericks put things out of reach with a four run seventh inning. Game two of the weekend series is set for Saturday afternoon at 3 p.m. (ET) / 2 p.m. (CT).

SCORING INNINGS
BOT 1st | GS 0 - UTA 1 | Starting pitcher Seth Shuman got the first two outs quickly, but gave up a walk to the three-hole hitter. Back-to-back singles for the home side plated the run as UTA took an early 1-0 lead.
TOP 2nd | GS 1 - UTA 1 | A leadoff walk to cleanup hitter Noah Ledford gave the Eagles the ammunition they needed to tie the game at 1-1. After the leadoff walk, Austin Thompson doubled down the left field line to move Ledford around to third. A sacrifice fly by Matt Anderson leveled the game at 1-1.
BOT 2nd | GS 1 - UTA 5 | Arlington got four in the second off four hits to re-take the lead and take a commanding 5-1 advantage.
BOT 6th | GS 1 - UTA 8 | The Mavericks took advantage of a one out error to plate three in the sixth and push the lead to 8-1.
TOP 7th | GS 5 - UTA 8 | Georgia Southern sliced the UTA lead to three in the seventh with a four-spot of runs. Mason McWhorter got things started with a two-run pinch hit home run to center. Later in the inning Austin Thompson singled through the left side to plate two more and make it an 8-5 game.
BOT 7th | GS 5 - UTA 12 | UTA answered the crooked number by the Eagles with a crooked number of their own, scoring four in the home half of the seventh off four hits.

NOTES
- Mason McWhorter's two run home run in the seventh was Georgia Southern's first pinch hit home run in more than a year. McWhorter clobbered the no-doubter over the wall in center to spark a four-run seventh inning. The last Eagle to hit a pinch hit home run was Noah Searcy in the 2018 opener at Georgia on February 16th, 2018.
- Starting pitcher Seth Shuman lasted just two innings, his shortest career start to fall to 1-4 on the year. He allowed five runs, four earned off six hits with one strikeout.
- Austin Thompson had a two-hit game, going 2-for-4 with two RBIs to extend his hit streak to six games.

UP NEXT
Georgia Southern and UT Arlington will resume the three game series on Saturday afternoon at 3 p.m. (ET) / 2 p.m. (CT). Coverage is available on the Georgia Southern Sports Network exclusively at GSEagles.com with premium video streaming at UTAMavs.com.