Once again, the Saint Lous University baseball team played entertaining, scrappy and competitive baseball for nine innings yesterday against Indiana State University.
It just wasn’t quite enough to steal a victory, as they fell 7-5 to the Sycamores to drop their record to 2-3 so far.
“I guess you can say we went out and competed,” senior pitcher Scott Turmail said.
SLU certainly had their fair share of chances. They managed 11 hits in the game. Unfortunately, the second, third, fourth and sixth innings all saw the Billikens strand two runners on base.
There were several bright spots in the losing effort. Junior catcher Ben Braaten and freshman infielder Lucas Calderon hit their first homers in Billiken uniforms. Calderon’s long ball was also his first career hit.
“We’re finding out who we are,” Turmail said.
Junior Zach Outman made the start and went six innings, giving up five hits and four earned runs. He struck out five and walked three.
“All you ask out of your starting pitcher is that he goes out there and competes and gives our team a chance to win,” Turmail said. “Early in the year you want to keep your pitch counts down at a minimum. Our guys have gone out there and kept us in games.”
Braaten said the team is still learning how to play together despite dealing with the absence of several injured players.
Senior Ryan Bennett, the top returning hitter on the team who is off to a .421 start, missed the ISU game due to a knee injury suffered during the team’s trip in California.
Juniors Jon Myers and Danny Brock as well as senior Tom Pinnell also have yet to make their debut.
“Those are four impact guys. We need them,” Braaten said.
In the meantime, the Billikens are trying to test out different players at different positions.
Despite these obstacles, Braaten says the defense has been solid.
“I think the biggest thing to take out of today’s loss is that we can never really coast. You have to play all nine innings with all nine guys,” Braaten said.
SLU won their first game of the year, an 8-7 triumph over Cal State Bakerfield on Feb. 20. They dropped the next two games, but still managed to finish the season-opening trip on a winning note, defeating UC Santa Barbara by the same score of 8-7.
“I think we’re going to be fine,” Braaten said. “Getting that first weekend out of the way with our new team was important. We’re trying to get that chemistry working-that’s the big thing for us now.”
