Bullpen Falls Apart In 10-14 Loss At Milligan
MILLIGAN, Tenn. (Feb. 17, 2008)--The Urbana University Blue Knight baseball team fell to Milligan College 14-10, finishing up the weekend at 1-2.

In the third game of the series, Urbana jumped out to a 7-3 lead after five and a half innings, but the sixth and seventh innings proved disastrous for the bullpen, as the Blue Knight pitching staff allowed nine walks and a hit batter over two innings to give Milligan (5-7) a 13-7 lead.

In the top of the first Kris Nealeigh, Jeff Hartwig, and Jordan Baker started the game with three straight singles.  Nealeigh scored after Mike Heck was hit by a pitch and Hartwig scored on a Russ Chambers sacrifice fly to give the Blue Knights a 2-0 lead.

Milligan would cut the lead in half in the bottom half of the first off of Urbana starter Cody Lawhorn. The Blue Knights scored twice to take the 3-2 lead. Lawhorn then settled down and pitched three scoreless innings, before his high pitch count on the opening weekend removed him from the game.

Urbana would tie the game in the fourth, with a one-out Chambers double and two-out single from Steve Froese to score Chambers. 

In the fifth, the Blue Knights would score three more times.  Hartwig would line a one-out double down the right field line.  Baker followed with a hard single to left and Mike Bezak would drive in Hartwig with a single up the middle.  Heck then doubled down the left field line scoring both Baker and Bezak to give the Blue Knights a three-run lead, 6-3.

The Blue Knights would add another in the top of the sixth to go ahead 7-3, before the floodgates opened.   Eight of the ten free base runners scored for Milligan over the next two innings, mixed in with a Baker DeCamp three-run home run in the seventh.  In both innings, Milligan only got two hits, but scored 10 times.

Urbana still had fight in them, scoring three times in the top of the eighth, Froese blasted a long home run to left field and after a Nealeigh triple, Baker hit his first home run as a Blue Knight to right field and cut the score to 13-10.

The Buffalos got an insurance run on Justin Motte's fourth extra base hit of the weekend, when he drilled a solo home run onto the middle of the Lady Buffs softball field and gave Milligan a 14-10 lead, which would hold up as the Blue Knights would go quietly in the top of the ninth.

Shane Pfouts would get the loss after recording his first save of the season on Saturday.  The Blue Knights drop to 1-2 on the season and travel to Georgetown, Kentucky this weekend to play Purdue North Central and Seton Hill on Saturday and Seton Hill and Georgetown on Sunday. 

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