Baseball's Comeback Falls short in one-run loss

courtesy Carl Lewis
courtesy Carl Lewis

ROCKY MOUNT, N.C. - The NC Wesleyan College Baseball team fell one run short in their comeback attempt vs. conference foe Greensboro College on Saturday afternoon falling 10-9.

After Wesleyan got down 8-0 in the fourth inning to the Pride, the Bishops would begin their rally going on to outscore the Pride 9-2 the rest of the game. It first started in the 4th on a sacrifice fly from freshman 3B Andrew Nichols followed by a three-run homer from senior DH Nate Gardner, his first of the season, in the 5th to trim their deficit to four at 8-4.

After Greensboro added two runs later on, the Pride would lead 10-4 heading to the bottom of the 7th. Wesleyan would then use consecutive RBI singles from senior Brandon Wheat and Nichols to trail 10-6. Senior CF Cedrick Kornegay would then crush a 3-run homer himself to make it 10-9 in the 8th inning. It was his 2nd straight day with a home run. Unfortunately, the Bishops would then run out of steam in the 9th and fall by one.

Wesleyan was led offensively by a 3-hit day from Wheat as well as multi-hit games from Nichols, 1B Trey Croom, and Kornegay. Kornegay also hit a triple along with his homer for a total of 7 total bases on the day and 3 RBIs.

Starting pitcher J.D. Makauskas got the loss (1-3) as he allowed 4 runs on 3 hits over 1 and 1/3 innings while relievers Chris Aubry and Michael Smith combined to allow just 2 runs over 4 innings with fellow reliever, junior Noah Shrock, tossing a scoreless ninth.

The Bishops fall to 11-6 overall and 4-3 in the conference as their 4-game win streak was snapped but they will look to start a new streak tomorrow when they finish their series with Greensboro at 2 PM.