Georgia Southern took advantage of costly errors by the Radford pitching to get out to a lead before getting the bats going to take a 12-4 victory on Sunday afternoon at J.I. Clements Stadium. The win gives the Eagles its first sweep of the 2024 season.
The bottom of the first inning saw Southern (7-8) take an early lead after Josh Tate and Sam Blancato drew walks and performed a double-steal before Kent Schmidt drew a walk as well. Sean Smith was hit by a pitch to score Tate, Sean White draw a walk to score Blancato, then T.J. McKenzie drew a walk to score Schmidt to take a 3-0 lead without ever having to swing the bat.
The bottom of the second inning saw Blancato score on a run-down on Smith between first and second base, with Blancato crossing the plate before Smith was tagged out to take a 4-0 lead.
The bottom of the fourth inning had the Eagles load the bases with the first three batters again, as McKenzie and Luke Odden were both hit by pitches, then Tate reached on a fielding error by the Radford third baseman. Blancato was hit by the next pitch to score McKenzie, and an RBI-single to the shortstop by Schmidt would score Odden. Jonathan Jaime sprayed a two-RBI knock to the right-center gap to score Tate and Blancato to bring the lead up to 8-0 after four frames.
Radford (5-8) made some noise in the top of the fifth inning when an RBI-single by Corbin Grantham scored Mason Self to get the Highlanders on the board. Shortly after, Conner Butler had a two-RBI double to score Brady Whitacre and Grantham to cut the lead to five runs at 8-3.
The bottom of the sixth inning saw Jaime score Blancato with a RBI-fielder's choice to bump the lead up to 9-3 after six frames.
In the bottom of the seventh inning, Jarrett Jenkins led off with a solo home run to straight-away center, the first home run of his career, to bring the Eagles to double digits for the second time this season. An RBI-single by Blancato would score Odden and an RBI-groundout by Schmidt would score Tate to bring the Eagles up to 12-3.
Radford made a final effort to generate some offense in the top of the ninth inning when Cameron Pittman scored Self with an RBI-groundout. With the bases loaded on two outs, Ben Johnson was brought in to deliver the final blow, getting the Big South Player of the Week Zack Whitacre to strike out and secure the sweep for Southern.
Ty Fisher earned his second win of the season after five innings of three-run baseball. Fisher saw down four and only allowed a single free base. Jordan Irizarry was tagged with the loss after loading the bases and hitting Smith, being responsible for the first three runs of the game without recording an out.
UP NEXT
Georgia Southern hosts Kennesaw State on Tuesday, March 12, before venturing up to Norfolk, Va., to take on Old Dominion to start conference play.
