Five home runs highlight EMCC’s home baseball doubleheader split with Holmes

SCOOBA – The Lions of East Mississippi Community College belted five home runs during Tuesday's home baseball doubleheader split with Holmes played at Gerald Poole Field. After getting back into the MACCC win column with a 9-4 victory over the Bulldogs in the opener, EMCC's dramatic seventh-inning comeback attempt fell just short in an 8-7 nightcap setback.

Tuesday's twin-bill split with Holmes snapped the Lions' four-game conference slide on the heels of last week's doubleheader losses to Mississippi Delta and Jones. EMCC's five homers against the Bulldogs, including one in each game by Southern Miss transfer Evan Radford and former Mississippi State signee Aiden Fancher – accounted for 11 of the team's 16 runs during the doubleheader.

In the nine-inning opener, the Lions' first five runs came via the home run. With freshman left-hander Ayden Alsobrooks, out of Starkville Academy, getting his first collegiate start on the mound, Fancher's two-run homer in the first inning and Ethan Medlin's solo shot in the fourth gave EMCC a 3-1 lead after four frames.

After Holmes knotted the score with two runs in the top of the fifth, the Lions answered with Radford's two-run blast off Holmes starting pitcher Cole Moudy in the home half to take the lead for good. EMCC added three insurance runs a frame later and one more in the seventh to account for the final five-run margin.

Offensively in the opener, EMCC's eight-hit team effort was led by Will Crawford and Gray Berry with two singles each. Middle reliever Landon Scruggs picked up his second win of the season by scattering five hits with four strikeouts and no walks over 3.2 innings of work.

The seven-inning nightcap was tied, 2-2, after three innings when back-to-back doubles from Holmes' Hayden Beall and Ethan Wood in the first inning were answered by Radford's two-run homer two frames later. Radford's game-tying home run was his team-leading ninth of the season and marked the fourth straight game in which he has homered.

The Bulldogs then seemingly took control of the contest by scoring four runs in the fourth off EMCC starting pitcher Walker Swearingen, including a two-run homer by Parker Knight. The visitors added two more tallies the next frame and took an 8-3 lead into the final inning.

The bottom of the seventh inning started out uneventful with Holmes starting pitcher John Paul Buckner, out of Starkville Academy, recording the first two outs via a pop out and a strikeout. Radford ignited EMCC's two-out rally with a double that was followed by Crawford walking and Alsobrooks getting hit by a pitch. Fancher, a Winston Academy product, then stepped in as the first of three straight pinch-hitters and blasted the first pitch he saw over the right-centerfield wall for a grand slam that cut the deficit to one run. After Joe Scarborough extended the game with a single and later advanced to second, Buckner was able to preserve his complete-game victory by striking out pinch-hitter Zack Griffith for the game's final out.

EMCC again totaled eight hits in the nightcap with Medlin and Radford leading the way at the top of the batting order with two hits apiece.

Head coach Brett Kimbrel's EMCC Lions (13-14, 2-6 MACCC) are scheduled to conclude their current 10-day conference home stand by playing host to the nationally fifth-ranked Meridian Eagles (18-8, 4-4 MACCC) during Saturday's (March 25) doubleheader on the Scooba campus. First pitch is set for 1 p.m. at EMCC's Gerald Poole Field.