March 31, 2009
San Antonio – Danny Cantu’s two-out single in the bottom of the ninth inning scored Grant Harrelson with the winning run as St. Mary’s University rallied for an exciting 5-4 victory over Texas A&M University-Kingsville in baseball action Tuesday night at V.J. Keefe Memorial Stadium.
After taking an early 3-0 lead, the Rattlers fell behind 4-3 through six innings. In the bottom of the seventh, they tied the game with a little help. With one out, Weston Baros (So., San Antonio) smacked a double to left center. One out later he moved to third on an infield single by Josh McElroy (Fr., Helotes). That brought up Michael Brzezinski (Sr., Helotes), who hit a ground ball to shortstop James Brown. Brown committed one of his three errors on the day, allowing Baros to score the tying run. That set up the ninth inning heroics.
Baros led off with a walk, but was eliminated on a fielder’s choice, which allowed Harrelson (So., San Antonio) to reach. McElroy reached on an error, moving Harrelson to second. The Javelinas stayed alive when third baseman Travis Earles made a spectacular catch on a bullet smacked down the third base line by Brzezinski. Cantu (Sr., Laredo), saved the day, smacking the 1-1 pitch from Tim Jones into left-centerfield, allowing Harrelson to score just ahead of the throw home.
Jonathon Perez (Fr., San Antonio) picked up his first collegiate win, allowing just two baserunners in 2 1/3 innings of work. He is now 1-2 this season. Jones took the loss, falling to 1-5 this season.
With the win the Rattlers improved to 22-11 this season. TAMUK fell to 14-22. The Rattlers will return to action on Friday when they host Heartland Conference leader, the University of Texas-Permian Basin in a doubleheader at V.J. Keefe Memorial Stadium, starting at 2 p.m.
St. Mary’s 5, Texas A&M-Kingsville 4 (Mar 31, 2009 at San Antonio, TX)
Weather: Partly Cloudy and Warm
Ben Odom faced 1 batter in the 7th.