The Barton Community College baseball team dropped a pair of non-conference contests Thursday in walk-off fashion as Coffeyville Community College grabbed the first leg of the series 5-4 and 10-9.
The Cougars slip to 31-13 on the season with Coffeyville's fifth straight victory improves the Red Ravens to 24-17. The teams will switch locations to the Cougars' Lawson-Biggs Field on Saturday to complete the four-game set with a 1:00 p.m. first pitch.
Reigning conference and national player of the week Alex Rodgers led the Cougars going 5-of-8 including a pair of doubles and his third home run of the year. Henry Hayman also collected five hits within his nine plate appearances, belting his fifth home run of the season in driving in a team leading five runs on the day.
The Cougars outhit Coffeyville by three but the defense had its share of eight miscues resulting in just five of the Red Ravens' fifteen runs being earned.
A pair of game one's trio of errors occurred in the deciding seventh inning with Carson Cornelius absorbing the opener's loss in dropping to 0-3 in relief duty. Despite getting a career high three innings on the hill in tying a personal best three strikeouts, Hollis Huff's third pitch in the ninth ended up beyond the barrier to suffer his first career loss in fifteen innings of work.
Barton Athletics