The Citadel drops series opener against Mercer

CHARLESTON, S.C. – The Citadel committed a pair of costly errors in the first inning that put the Bulldogs in a hole they were not able to dig out of in falling, 7-3, to Mercer in the Southern Conference opener Friday evening inside Joseph P. Riley, Jr. Park.

Game Information

Score: Mercer 7, The Citadel 3

Records: Mercer (15-8, 1-0), The Citadel (13-8, 0-1)

Location: Joseph P. Riley, Jr. Park (Charleston, South Carolina)

Series: Mercer leads 1-0

How it Happened

The Bears took advantage of a pair of Bulldog throwing errors to push across five unearned runs in the first inning. Eli Runyan and Ty Dalley each had RBI doubles in the frame.
The Bulldogs got a run back in the bottom of the first inning after Thomas Rollauer drew a leadoff walk and moved to third on a double from Noah Mitchell. Sawyer Reeves drove in Rollauer with a groundout to short.
MU added a run in the second inning on a solo homer from Jackson Cherry.
The Bulldogs got the offense going in the fourth inning as Reeves started the inning with a double into the left-field corner. Wells Sykes followed with a RBI triple into the right-field corner, before scoring on a Dylan Costa groundout.
The Bears added another unearned run in the eighth on a two-out single up the middle from Treyson Hughes.

Inside the Box Score

Right hander Gant Starling had a career day out of the bullpen as he allowed just one unearned run on three hits and seven strikeouts over 4.1 innings.
Starling had not pitched more than 2.1 innings in his career.
Sam Swygert (2-1) suffered the loss after allowing six runs, one earned, on nine hits and four strikeouts over 4.1 innings.
As a staff, the Bulldogs struck out 11 hitters, marking the 14th time this season the Bulldogs struck out at least 10 batters in a game.
The Citadel had seven hits, with seven different players collecting a hit.
Sawyer Reeves doubled and drove in a run, while Wells Sykes had a RBI triple.
Dylan Costa drove in the third run with a groundout.
Travis Lott collected a hit and was also hit by a pitch for the 11th time this season. He extended his streak of reaching safely to 31 games dating back to last season.
Ryan Lobus (3-1) allowed three runs on five hits and four strikeouts over 5.0 innings to pick up the victory.

On Deck

The teams play the middle game of the three-game series Saturday afternoon at the new start time of 1 p.m.