CHICKASHA, Okla. – Wayland Baptist held its own against 10
th-ranked Science & Arts of Oklahoma for five innings, but the Drovers proved worthy of their lofty ranking over the final frames and ended the Pioneers' season with a 14-7 victory in the Sooner Athletic Conference Tournament semifinals Sunday afternoon at Bill Smith Ballpark.
While second-seeded Science & Arts (35-12) advances to Monday's tourney championship game against top-seeded, second-ranked Oklahoma City (46-4), which defeated fourth-seeded Texas Wesleyan, 13-12, Wayland saw its season come to a close. The sixth-seeded Pioneers wound up 29-23 under first-year head coach
Todd Weldon.
Wayland's SAC Tournament featured two wins, 3-1 and 4-1, over third-seeded Southwestern Assemblies of God and two losses to Science & Arts. The Pioneers fell to the Drovers 10-0 in eight innings on Saturday but made a much better game of it Sunday.
A win would have forced a second game against the Drovers in the double-elimination format, and it appeared Wayland – playing as the home team on S&A's field – might get it done leading 5-2 after four innings and 7-5 after five. But the Pioneers were shut out the rest of the way, while the Drovers put it away with a six-run sixth, followed by two more runs in the eighth and another in the ninth.
S&A's big sixth inning started with a lead-off home run before the next five runs crossed with two outs. The Drovers did their damage on five hits – including a would-be inning-ending fly ball to right that was lost in the sun and resulted in the go-ahead runs followed immediately by a bad-hop RBI-single to short – two walks and two stolen bases.
Now down 11-7, the Pioneers never recovered from the hard-luck inning, managing only one hit in their final three at-bats.
For the third time in four tournament games, Wayland wound up with nine hits, three by
Danny Arambula who also had two RBIs and scored twice.
Arturo Disla homered twice to end the season as co-team leader with 17, and had three RBIs and three runs.
Tyler Latham also had two hits.
Three Drovers pitchers combined to record 13 strikeouts, by two the most of the season for Wayland. WBU's
Gloymer Cuevas,
Garrett McClain (2-1) and
Chase Jones allowed 14 hits while striking out seven and walking seven.
The loss was the 18
th in the last 19 games for Wayland against Science & Arts. The Pioneers' lone win against the Drovers since 2017 came earlier this year in the finale of the teams' regular-season series, 6-5.
