SEGUIN, Texas -- Texas Lutheran baseball battled to two hard fought victories Saturday at Katt-Isbel Field to complete the series sweep over University of St. Thomas winning game one 7-2 before coming from behind to win game two, 11-9.
Prior to the game, Texas Lutheran honored former Texas Lutheran baseball player Mark Love and announced the first annual "Mark Love Award" winner - awarded to the player who demonstrates team leadership, charm, resilience and dependability - with the honors going to senior Hayden Mundy (Deer Park/La Porte).
Zach Longshore (Richmond/Fort Bend Travis) pitched four innings and allowed two runs on four hits and picked up his third win of the season - striking out four batters in the process. Brendan Beard (New Waverly/Coldspring-Oakhurst) tossed five shutout innings in relief - striking out four and only allowing one walk.
Joe Jimenez (San Antonio/Johnson) went 2-for-4 with a home run and two RBI, while Alec Sanchez (Waxahachie/Waxahachie) finished 2-for-4 with a double and 2 RBI.
St. Thomas took an early 2-0 lead - scoring a run in each of the first two innings - before Texas Lutheran would respond in the bottom of the second with Jimenez launching a solo homer and Alec Sanchez scoring Tyler Post (San Antonio/Johnson) to tie the game 2-2.
Texas Lutheran would score seven unanswered runs - scoring in four consecutive frames. Jimenez would strike again in the third inning with an RBI single to give TLU a 3-2 lead. A sacrifice bunt from Blade Strzelczyk (San Antonio/East Central) would score Randy Huerta (New Braunfels/New Braunfels) to bring the score to 4-2.
Texas Lutheran would score two more runs in the fourth courtesy of an RBI double from Holden Philippus (San Antonio/San Antonio Christian) and Alec Sanchez would add another in the fifth with an RBI double to bring the game to its final score of 7-2.
In what made for a back-and-forth game two, Texas Lutheran rallied to score three runs in the bottom of the eighth inning to complete the sweep of the Celts.
Prior to the eighth inning, Saturday's finale was a whirlwind. Texas Lutheran would score in the first three innings to take an early 6-1 edge with starter JT Taylor (Sugar Land/Fort Bend Christian) only allowing one run in his first three innings of work.
St. Thomas came alive in the fourth inning scoring six runs on six hits to take a 7-6 lead.
Fortunately, Texas Lutheran would not go quietly as Holden Philippus would hit a two-run home run in the bottom of the fifth as Texas Lutheran reclaimed the lead, 8-7.
St. Thomas would go ahead of the Bulldogs in the top of the eighth following a two-run top of the frame.
Texas Lutheran would respond with three runs of their own with Aric Vasquez (San Antonio/Brandeis) giving the Bulldogs a 10-9 lead following a two-RBI double. A sacrifice-fly from Carson Draehn (Brenham/Brenham) would give the Bulldogs pitching staff extra run support heading into the top of the ninth inning,
Blake Cappadona (Mont Belvieu/Barbers Hill), who started the game in right field, would take the mound in the ninth inning shutting the door on any potential St. Thomas comeback for his second save of the season.
With the sweep, the Bulldogs streak of conference series wins moves to 19 dating back to 2018. The Bulldogs also extended their win streak to seven games.
The Bulldogs begin a four-game road trip with a mid-week non-conference matchup with the Concordia University Tornados at Tornado Field on Tuesday, April 5. First pitch is scheduled for 6:30 PM. All streaming and live stats links can be found on tlubulldogs.com.
For more information on Texas Lutheran baseball and all TLU athletics, you can find updates on tlubulldogs.com and all official TLU social media channels (@tluathletics and @TLU_Baseball on Twitter, @tlubulldogs on Instagram and Facebook, and @tlu_athletics on TikTok).
