Sloppy Arkansas hangs on in 10th inning

FAYETTEVILLE -- The No. 8 Arkansas baseball team overcame a sloppy defensive showing and rallied for two runs in the 10th inning for a 10-9 victory over Louisiana-Monroe on Tuesday.

Casey Martin raced home with the winning run on Jordan McFarland's bases-loaded grounder to shortstop against a drawn-in infield with no outs as Joey Jordan's throw went wide of the plate. Heston Kjerstad's single -- his third hit -- tied the game 9-9 moments earlier, scoring Eric Cole, who had led off the inning against closer Keegan Curtis (2-1) with an infield single.

Evan Lee went 2 for 6 in the leadoff spot, hit a go-ahead three-run home run in the sixth and posted the final two outs on the mound to improve to 2-1.

The University of Arkansas, Fayetteville (20-9) committed four errors, its most in a game since 2016, and had several other lapses on the chilly, windy evening before a crowd of 1,689 at Baum Stadium.

"Sometimes you win a game that maybe you didn't deserve to win," Arkansas Coach Dave Van Horn said. "I'm not saying we didn't deserve to win it because we kept fighting and we never gave up, but I feel fortunate that we did get a win."

Louisiana-Monroe (15-13), which had three home runs among its seven hits, tied the game with a four-run ninth inning, then took the lead on Johnny DeLaCruz's perfectly placed squeeze bunt in the 10th.

"We didn't panic," Van Horn said. "We came back and won. ... We didn't feel like the game was over. We felt like we were going to win the game and we did."

The Razorbacks had errors that led to five unearned runs.

Lee's three-run home run against hard-throwing right-hander Cole Gray, his second, put the Razorbacks ahead 6-4 in the sixth in support of Jake Reindl, who had struggled in his last few outings. Reindl allowed 3 hits and no walks or runs and threw 34 strikes among his 47 pitches in three innings.

Barrett Loseke struck out five in two scoreless innings in the seventh and eighth to run his strikeout total to 21 in 14 1/3 innings.

The Razorbacks took an 8-4 lead into the ninth and Ramage got one out before things went haywire. He struck out DeLaCruz, but the pitch skipped to the backstop, allowing DeLaCruz to reach first base. Turner Francis drew a walk, then pinch-hitter Will Daniels laced a line drive to left field that nicked off Kjerstad's glove for a run-scoring error. A wild pitch moved both runners up, before Peyton Lacoste smacked a tying three-run homer over the left field wall to make it 8-8.

Arkansas starter Jackson Rutledge allowed his first earned run in the second inning when Braedon Barrett's three-run home run to right field gave the Warhawks a 3-0 lead.

The Razorbacks got right back into contention in the bottom of the second on a Jared Gates single and Opitz's sacrifice fly.

The Warhawks expanded their lead to 4-2 in the third when clean-up hitter Chad Bell hit an opposite-field home run just inside the left-field foul pole off Rutledge.

Arkansas got a gift run in the fifth after Lacoste dropped Eric Cole's pop-up to open the inning. Bonfield's ground ball to shortstop later scored Cole to make it 4-3.

Sports on 04/04/2018