NORMAL, Ill. – The Illinois State baseball program recorded a conference opening series sweep over Belmont with a 9-3 victory over the Bruins Sunday afternoon at Duffy Bass Field. With the win, the Redbirds improve to 17-7 and have tallied nine consecutive victories.
Five Redbirds tallied two hits in the victory as Illinois State recorded double-digit hits (12) for the ninth straight game.
Redshirt Sophomore Brayden Bakes tallied his eighth straight game with two or more hits and added his fourth home run of the series in the win.
Junior Luke Stulga recorded a pair of hits, including a double and triple, and has notched two hits in five of the last six games.
Graduate Camden Karczewski tallied two doubles in the victory to push his career-longest hitting streak to 11 games.
Junior Ryan Bakes added two hits and a pair of RBIs to move his hitting streak to a career-best five games. Bakes has recorded an RBI in all three contests in the series.
Senior Nolan Barry tallied his fifth multi-hit performance of the season with two hits in the win.
Redshirt Freshman Luke Teschke earned the first victory of his career with a career-best 6.0 innings pitched. Teschke added four strikeouts and limited the Bruins to two hits and one run scored.
The Redbirds opened the scoring in the second inning to take a 1-0 lead as Ryan Bakes drove home Stulga on a sacrifice fly, following a lead-off triple from Stulga to open the frame. An inning later, Illinois State added to its advantage following an RBI single from Brayden Bakes, scoring Sophomore Eric Machej to make the score 2-0.
In the top of the fourth, Belmont pulled a run back to cut into the Redbird's lead with a solo home run to move the score to 2-1. Moments later, Illinois State responded with a solo shot at their home as Brayden Bakes delivered his fourth home run of the series to move the Redbirds' lead to 3-1 in the sixth. Illinois State added another run in the sixth as Ryan Bakes scored Stulga on a RBI single to move the Redbird lead to 4-1.
Belmont clawed back in the seventh inning, adding a pair of runs to make the score 4-3, following a sacrifice fly and single from the Bruins. In the eighth, the Bruins continued to battle as they loaded the bases, but Graduate Reece Clapp shut the door with a strikeout to work out of the jam and maintain the Redbirds' advantage.
In the bottom of the eighth, Illinois State pulled away, growing the lead to 9-3 with five runs scored in the inning following RBI singles from Graduate Payton McHarg and Barry, and a pair of doubles from Karczewski and Junior Graham Mastros.
After working out of the bases-loaded situation in the eighth inning, Clapp recorded a 1-2-3 ninth frame to secure the Redbird victory.
NOTES
- The Redbirds extended their winning streak to nine games with the victory. In the win streak, Illinois State has recorded at least 10 hits in all contests and has tallied double-digit hit totals in 12 of the last 14 games.
- With the sweep, the Redbirds have captured their conference-opening series sweep in the Steve Holm era.
- Redshirt Freshman Luke Teschke earned his first career victory after recording the longest outing of his career with 6.0 innings pitched. Teschke limited the Bruins to two hits and one run scored.
- Redshirt Sophomore Brayden Bakes extended his hitting streak to a career-best nine games and has tallied two or more hits in the last eight games.
- With a pair of hits, Bakes has totaled 16 games with at least two hits this season.
- In the victory, Bakes tallied two RBIs to record his fourth consecutive game with two or more RBIs.
- Graduate Camden Karczewski extended his hitting streak to a career-best 11 games with two doubles in the victory. Karczewski recorded his second game this season with two doubles and his first since February 28 against MTSU.
- Junior Luke Stulga added his 13th multi-hit performance of the season with a pair of hits in the win. Stulga has tallied two or more hits in five of the last six games.
- With a base hit, Junior Graham Mastros extended his reached-base streak to 15 games and joined Stulga for the team lead in the category.
- Junior Ryan Bakes tallied two hits in the win to set a new career-best hitting streak of five games.
- Senior Nolan Barry recorded his fifth multi-hit performance of the season with two hits and became the eighth Redbird with five or more multi-hit games this season.
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