LAKELAND, Fla.—Five home runs, four coming with two outs helped Southeastern rally back to beat St. Thomas on Thursday night with a 9-7 win in the opener of the Sun Conference series.
The second home run of the night by right fielder
Josh Smith ended up being the difference as the fifth-year senior drilled a one-out first-pitch fastball well beyond the left field wall in the bottom of the eighth to break a 7-7 tie.
"I was watching his velocity when I was on deck and it was pretty high, so my approach was to sit on the fastball," said Smith. "Our approach was to be a hard out every time and try to get on base and help the pitchers out."
Smith also had a two-out homer in the second inning to give the Fire a 3-0 lead after a two-out homer in the first by
David Castillo.
Gary Lora pushed the lead to four with a solo homer in the third.
In the fourth, St. Thomas got on the board with a two-run homer by Angelo Piloto but the Fire responded with an RBI double by
Cristopher Munoz and an RBI single by
Matt Delay to go up 6-2 heading to the fifth.
Munoz had a team-best three hits.
The Bobcats picked up a pair of bases-loaded walks in the seventh to cut the lead in half. A two-out home run by
Isaac Nunez in the bottom of the inning put the hosts back up three. Another bases-loaded walk in the eighth and a passed ball got St. Thomas within a run and a sacrifice fly tied it.
Nunez finished 2-for-3 with two runs scored.
After Smith's go-ahead homer, the Fire got a pinch hit, two-out RBI single by
Chayce Bryant as an insurance run.
The Fire finished the night with six two-out hits.
On the mound,
Robb Adams struck out nine over the first 6.1 innings. The bullpen walked five over the final 2.2, but allowed just one earned run on one hit.
Bryce McDonald picked up the win, retiring two of the three hitters he faced and
Jaren Warwick recorded his first win of the season with a 1-2-3 ninth.
The teams will play a doubleheader tomorrow starting at 3 p.m.
