Blazers fall to Delta State in GSC tourney
Published 7:00 am Sunday, May 6, 2012
Delta State took advantage of 10 walks by the Valdosta State pitching staff to defeat the Blazers 11-2 in the second day of play of the Gulf South Conference Tournament at State Mutual Stadium Saturday.
With the win, Delta State improved to 37-11 while Valdosta State fell to 27-18.
Delta State opened the scoring in the top of the first inning without the benefit of a hit. Jordan Chovanec drew a walk to open the game before Ben Kingsley and Jon Carnhan each drew one-out walks. A wild pitch from VSU starter Kevin Rogers plated Chovanec for a 1-0 DSU lead.
Valdosta State quickly answered the run as with one out in the bottom of the first Marc Overstreet singled and scored as Christian Glisson followed with his 10th home run of the year to put the Blazers in front 2-1.
The Statesmen regained the lead in the second inning as they scored three runs in the frame. With one out in the frame, Tyler Aldridge singled and Josh Crowdus drew a walk. After a fielder’s choice retired Aldridge, Sam Kidd delivered a base hit to score Crowdus while Chovanec, who reached on the fielder’s choice, scored on a balk. Ben Kingsley followed with a ground ball to third that appeared to get VSU out of the inning, but the throw to first on the play sailed wide of the bag to allow Kidd to score as Delta State built a 4-2 advantage.
A hit batter with the bases loaded gave Delta State another run in the top of the third while a two-out single in the frame pushed the DSU lead to 7-2, and chased Rogers. Zach John came on and appeared to get out of the inning with a grounder off the bat of Jon Carnahan, but a throwing error on the play kept the inning alive and scored Kidd. A base hit by Michael Vinson followed and drove in two more as the Statesmen built an eight run lead.
The Statesmen added an 11th run in the fourth inning to close out the scoring.
Rogers allowed just five hits, but also walked five and hit two batters and surrendered eight runs, six earned, as he fell to 3-5. DSU starter Colton Mitchell allowed just four hits and two runs as he improved to 8-0 on the year.
