Baseball loses two Friday

NEW ORLEANS – The 16th-ranked Loyola Wolf Pack baseball team ended the regular season on Friday by losing both games of their doubleheader with No. 25 William Carey. Loyola (35-14, 18-12 in SSAC) will now head to Jackson, Tennessee, to compete in the Southern States Athletic Conference Baseball Championship May 1-4. 
 

The Wolf Pack will be the No. 4 seed in the tournament, playing in a pool with No. 1 Faulkner, No. 5 Mobile and No. 8 Blue Mountain Christian. The official schedule is still to be determined. 
 

Game 1: #25 William Carey 7, #16 Loyola 5

It was a pitchers' duel for the first three innings, but William Carey struck first with a six-run fourth inning. Loyola answered that with three runs in the bottom half, highlighted by Collin Zeringue's two-run home run to right-center. Jaxon Buratt and Landon Manson got the rally started with a double and single, respectively, with one out, and Garrett Beadle picked up the first RBI off a sacrifice fly to help make the deficit 6-3. 
 

Both teams scored again in the fifth as well. Carey got a solo home run, while Aaron Davis scored all the way from first base on a double down the left-field line by Jake Mills, making the score 7-4. Zeringue picked up another RBI in the sixth, this time on an RBI double down the right-field line, making the game 7-5, but that was all the scoring from either team. 
 

Game 2: #25 William Carey 18, #16 Loyola 15

After the Crusaders got a solo homer in the opening frame, Loyola pushed five runs across in the bottom half to take an early 5-1 lead. Buratt and Zeringue walked and Manson was hit by a pitch with one out to start things, then an infield error scored the first run while keeping the bases loaded. Kason Cullins singled to right to bring home two more runs, 3-1, and another error on the tail-end of the play scored the fourth run, 4-1, while moving Cullins to third. 
 

William Carey, however, answered with eight runs in the second, three in the third, and three more in the fifth to grab ahold of the game. A Cullins solo home run in the fourth made the score 14-6 after five innings. 
 

A six-spot in the sixth inning got the Wolf Pack back in the game, 14-12, using just two hits with two walks and three hit by pitches to score the runs. Cullins singled home the first run, then pinch hitter Tucker Ganley got plunked to plate the second run, 14-8. A wild pitch brought home Cullins, then a double by Buratt plated two more, 14-11. A passed ball scored the final run, 14-12, to give Loyola some life. The Pack made it a one-run game in the seventh off an RBI single by Mills, too, but WCU pushed back ahead by five, 18-13 with a four-run eighth. 
 

Loyola, again, made things interesting in its final at-bat. With two outs, Mills and Brandon Mooney had back-to-back singles, and Buratt loaded the bases with a walk. Manson stepped up and scored one run on a single to right field, 18-15, and the would-be game-winning grand slam off the bat of Zeringue was caught on the warning track in left field.  
 

Pack Facts

• Kason Cullins went 4-for-5 at the plate with three runs scored, four RBI, and his fourth home run of the season. 

• This was the third time Cullins has posted four hits in a game in his Wolf Pack career. 

• Jaxon Buratt had two hits in all three games of the William Carey series. He's now recorded a hit in 16 consecutive games.

• Buratt is also eighth in single-season runs in the Wolf Pack record book with 54 this season. 

• Collin Zeringue's Game 1 home run was his eighth of the season. He also has 55 RBI this season, which is tied for the sixth-most in a season in program history.