Redhawks beat Billikens, keep momentum for big OVC series

The Southeast Missouri State baseball team used four innings of stellar relief from sophomore Adam Pennington and a five-run ninth inning to finish off Saint Louis University and extend its winning streak to six games with a 10-3 victory Tuesday night in St. Louis.

The Ohio Valley Conference-leading Redhawks improved to 27-10 with the nonconference win and will ride the momentum into a critical OVC showdown with Jacksonville State this weekend.

The loss was the eighth in a row for SLU, which fell to 16-22.

Southeast junior Chris Caffrey, who went 3-for-4, broke a 1-1 tie in the fourth inning with a bases-loaded single off sophomore reliever Luke Sommerfeld that scored two runs and put the Redhawks ahead for good.

Senior left fielder Garrett Gandolfo, the reigning OVC Player of the Week, extended his hitting streak to 17 games with a 3-for-5 performance that included an RBI single in the fifth inning off freshman Ryan Lefner that pushed the lead to 4-1.

Billikens freshman Cole Dubet doubled to open the first inning and later came around to score the first run off Southeast starter Jacob Lawrence, but the senior right-hander followed with three scoreless innings that allowed the Redhawks to grab the lead.

Southeast pulled even when Caffrey scored on a wild pitch by starter Jackson Wark in the top of the third before surging ahead on Caffrey's hit in the following frame.

Wark took the loss. He was the first of nine pitchers used by SLU and allowed three hits, three runs and four walks over 3 1/3 innings.

Lawrence, the winning pitcher, allowed an RBI single to Dubet in the fifth and did not retire any of the three batters he faced in the sixth.

Lawrence departed with a 4-3 lead and was responsible for runners at second and third with nobody out. However, Pennington, a left-hander from Jackson, preserved the lead, retiring the next three batters with a strikeout sandwiched between a pair of groundouts.

Lawrence gave up eight hits over five innings, striking out five and walking one.

Pennington allowed just one hit over the final four innings for his first save. He struck out two and did not walk a batter.

The Redhawks added a run in the seventh on another wild pitch before tacking on five runs in the ninth.

Southeast outhit the Billikens 12-9.

The two teams will meet again on May 3 in Cape Girardeau.

Southeast will take a 16-2 conference record into a three-game series that begins with a 6 p.m. contest Friday with second-place Jacksonville State, in Jacksonville, Alabama. The Gamecocks are 13-2 in OVC play.