LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Behind one of its best offensive showings of the season, the Bellarmine University baseball team captured a 16-8 win over Austin Peay State on Wednesday at Knights Field.
Bellarmine (9-31) tied season highs in home runs (four) and doubles (five) against future ASUN rival Austin Peay (16-26). The Knights' 16 runs marked their third-highest total of the season while their 18 hits tied their third-best output.
Matt Higgins continued his home run onslaught with two more long balls. The senior left fielder has now amassed 17 homers this season and boosted his program-record career total to 40. In addition, behind a 3-for-5 outing that also included a double, Higgins moved into the program's all-time top five for career hits, where he now sits with 239.
Senior
Jacob Mulcahy cranked his fifth home run of the season and 16th of his career, which is only two shy of cracking the top 15 in program history. Redshirt freshman
Webster Walls made an indelible memory by recording his first collegiate hit on a solo home run in the seventh, garnering perhaps the rowdiest celebration on a day filled with them.
Standout performances abounded. Higgins launched a go-ahead-for-good solo homer in the fourth and a two-run shot in the sixth. Sophomore catcher
Ashton Smith matched Higgins with three hits, including an RBI single in Bellarmine's four-run first.
Junior third baseman
Peyton Back collected two doubles and three RBIs, while Mulcahy, senior second baseman
Colin Bertsch and senior shortstop
Clayton Mehlbauer tallied two hits apiece as well.
All nine of Bellarmine's starters notched at least one hit, with sophomore first baseman
Davis Crane delivering an RBI single in the first and walking twice, and senior designated hitter
A.J. Arnold lacing an RBI double in the fifth.
That fifth inning was key for Bellarmine. The Knights had taken a 6-5 lead on Higgins' homer in the fourth, and they packed on five more runs the next frame.
Not stopping there, Bellarmine piled up four more runs in the sixth, punctuated by Higgins' second long ball. The cherry on top came when Walls wrangled his first career hit on a solo smash to right center in the seventh.
Pitching-wise, it was a staff day for Bellarmine. Junior righthander
Ryan Johnson settled things down by striking out two in a perfect fifth.
It was the first inning where Austin Peay didn't score, and freshman righthander
Arren Hash and junior righthander
Devin Ecklar followed Johnson with a scoreless inning each, as Hash fanned two and Ecklar struck out the side. Behind that trio, Knights hurlers combined for nine strikeouts.
Bellarmine will host Eastern Kentucky in a three-game series starting at 2 p.m. (ET) Friday.
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