LAKELAND, Fla. --- For the second day in a row, Southeastern University (Fla.) erased an early 5-0 deficit against the University of St. Francis baseball team, scoring 11 unanswered runs on Wednesday night en route to an 11-5 win and the Fire's school-record 24th victory in a row.
Southeastern, which jumped from the No.4 position to the No.1 spot in the NAIA Baseball Coaches' Poll earlier on Wednesday, scored 12 runs in its last two innings to win 12-5 on Tuesday night.
Luis Cabrera's grand slam in a five-run third inning to tie the contest on Wednesday was the big blow for the Fire, who had seven different players drive in runs. That included Nolan Machibroda, who recorded two RBI.
Josh Tesch (SR/Lockport, Ill.) tripled home the first run for the Saints and scored himself two batters later on a Kevin Rada (SR/Valencia, Venezuela) single to put USF up 2-0 after one inning.
The Saints then loaded the bases in the second inning before Dolan Nicholson (SR/Denton, Tex.) earned a walk to make it a 3-0 game. John Peterson (JR/Palos Heights, Ill.) followed with a fielder's choice to score the fourth run before Eric Maffie (FR/Coal Valley, Ill.) provided the final Saint tally of the night on a wild pitch.
Strong relief pitching by Southeastern (25-1) shut the door on the Saints for the second straight night after the second inning. USF went hitless over the next four innings before collecting one single in both the seventh and eighth innings.
Carlos Soto (1-0) did the heavy work out of the bullpen, hurling 6 1/3 innings and allowing just the two hits. He also yielded four walks, while striking out seven batters. Al Pesto added three more strikeouts in the ninth to close out the game.
After tying the game in the third inning, Southeastern went up for good with three runs in the fifth inning, before adding two more insurance runs in the sixth and one in the seventh.
Nick Clemmons (JR/Channahon, Ill.), one of six Saint pitchers on the night, was charged with the loss. He fell to 0-2 on the season.
Up Next
The Saints (5-15) take Thursday off before closing out their Florida trip with a 3 pm contest against NAIA No.16 ranked Webber International University on Friday.
