Eighth-ranked OBU takes two from Pioneers

Box Score 1 | Box Score 2

Oklahoma Baptist came into town looking like a baseball team determined to put an end to a uncharacteristic four-game losing streak, and that's just what it did on Thursday afternoon at Wilder Field as the eighth-ranked Bison posted a pair of Sooner Athletic Conference victories over first-place Wayland Baptist, 13-7 and 14-1.
 
OBU (32-4, 11-2 SAC) scored a combined 11 first-inning runs – six in the first game and five in the second – as the Bison jumped on top early in both games and stayed there. The Pioneers (24-14, 11-3) weren't at their best, committing four errors in the opener then managing just three hits in game two.
 
The losses dropped Wayland, ranked the equivalent of 36^th in the NAIA Coaches' Top 25 Poll, from first into fourth place in the SAC standings, behind OBU, fifth-ranked Oklahoma City (27-8, 10-2) and Texas Wesleyan (17-12, 9-2). The Pioneers will look to salvage a win in the series finale at 1 p.m. Friday back at Wilder Field.
 
In Thursday's first game, Wayland responded to OBU's six-run, three-home run first inning with a six-run second to tie the score.  Brayden Blackwell, Will Bass and Aaron Vallance delivered back-to-back-to-back RBI-doubles, then two batters later Ernesto Lizardi came up with yet another two-bagger, this one with the bases loaded that the Bison centerfielder couldn't quite get to that plated the final three runs of the frame to knot the score.
 
The Pioneers, though, scored only two more runs the rest of the day.
 
The first came in the fifth inning of the first game, but that was in between OBU scoring three runs in the fifth and sixth innings to pull away in the opener.
 
Pioneer ace Tyler Adams (6-1) suffered his first loss of the season, giving up 10 runs (seven earned) and eight hits in 4 1/3 innings before leaving the game after being hit in the leg by a line drive. After Logan Evans also struggled against the Bison in giving up three earned runs on three hits while walking three in 1 1/3 innings, Kyle Parriera came in and held OBU hitless over the final 1 1/3.

Senior Kelvin Rivas, who like Adams entered the game with a 6-0 record, struck out nine Pioneers as the 6-foot-4, 270-pound Puerto Rican came within an out of going the distance. Wayland loaded the bases in the seventh inning, and OBU coach Bobby Cox brought in reliever Kyle Fimbrez who struck out the only batter he faced to end the game.
 
OBU got another outstanding pitching effort in game two from junior lefty Nathan Thompson of Santa Ynez, Calif.
 
Staked to a 5-0 first-inning lead after the Bison took advantage of three hits, a pair of walks and a costly Wayland error, Thompson gave up a double down the right-field line to Bass on his first pitch of the game. After that, he allowed just two base runners through six innings – one on a walk and the other on an error.
 
OBU's bats, meanwhile, exploded for another big inning in the fifth when the Bison put up seven runs and knocked out Bridges, who went to the dugout having allowed nine runs (seven earned) on nine hits with five walks and no strikeouts. Reliever Jordie Henry didn't have any answers either, as he allowed five runs (three earned) on five hits in 1 2/3. Joey DiCarlo finished up the mound, allowing three hits but no runs in 1 1/3.
 
Meanwhile, the Pioneers scraped together a couple of more hits off Thompson in the seventh inning. After Lorenzo Soriano drew a lead-off walk, Austin Davis doubled down the left-field line. It would have scored Soriano, but he tripped coming around third.
 
He wound up getting in anyway, though, when after Chris Buitron walked Kyle Herrington hit an RBI-single, avoiding what would have been Wayland's third shutout loss of the season.
 

The 14 runs were the most allowed in a loss by the Pioneers all season. Wayland gave up 15 runs to Midland, Neb., but scored 12 in the last two innings to win that game, 16-15.