East Mississippi earns doubleheader road baseball split at Bishop State with 13-2 nightcap victory

MOBILE, Ala. – Ringing up multiple runs in five straight innings, the visiting East Mississippi Community College baseball team earned a doubleheader split at Bishop State Community College by convincingly taking the nightcap 13-2 after dropping a 3-2 decision Friday afternoon.

After a scoreless first inning in the second game, EMCC's first six batters reached base to begin the second.  Following a lead-off walk to Chris McCullough and back-to-back singles by JoVaughn McNabb and Hunter Brannan, Kyle Liberto's RBI single preceded a two-run, bases-loaded single by Drew Standland to make it 4-0 and give the Lions as much offense as they would need.

Despite BSCC's two-run bottom of the second off EMCC starting pitcher JC Redden, the Lions continued their 13-hit attack with two more scores in the third on McNabb's two-run double.  Another pair of runs in the fourth gave way to a three-run fifth inning by the visitors.  EMCC then extended the margin to run-rule status with two more tallies in the sixth inning on a sacrifice fly by Liberto and another run-producing single by Standland.

Offensively for the winners in game two, Standland and McNabb had three hits apiece, while Brannan added a pair of singles.  Standland, a product of Oak Grove High School, also drove home three runs and scored a couple.  McNabb and Liberto each had two runs batted in.

Redden, from New Hope High School, raised his pitching record to 2-1 on the year while giving up two runs on three hits with four strikeouts in four innings of work.  Cody Allsup and Mo Brown tossed the fifth and sixth innings, respectively, to close out the winning effort.

To begin the afternoon, the Lions rallied from a 3-0 deficit with two runs in the top of the sixth inning.  After Bishop State reached EMCC middle reliever Jake Bracewell for three runs in the fifth, the visitors promptly answered in their next at-bat.  On the heels of back-to-back walks to Taylor Stafford and Liberto, the Lions pulled to within a run on consecutive one-out RBI singles by David Pimentel and McCullough.  However, a pair of subsequent fly outs to right field ended the inning and thwarted the potential comeback attempt.

With each team being credited with six hits apiece in the opener, Pimentel and Emil Ellis each paced EMCC with 2-for-3 efforts at the plate.

Coach Chris Rose's 5-5 East Mississippi Lions return to the diamond Wednesday (Feb. 25) by playing host to rival East Central Community College in a scheduled 1 p.m. doubleheader at Gerald Poole Field on the Scooba campus.