May 21, 2008

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Second-seeded Southern Miss scored five runs in the first inning and went on to an 8-5 victory over No. 7 UCF, 8-5 Wednesday afternoon in the third game of the 2008 Entergy C-USA Baseball Championship being hosted by Tulane University.

Bo Davis led the Golden Eagles (39-18) with three hits, while Chris Matesich had a pair of hits and three RBI.

Davis opened the game with a single to right, advanced to second base on a balk and moved to third on a wild pitch. James Ewing singled through the right side to score him. Trey Sutton added a single, followed by a Kyle Maxie single that scored Ewing. Drew Carson cleared the bases with a home run to dead center field that flew several feet above the 400-foot marker.

UCF (31-26) answered with a three spot in the top of the fourth. Kiko Vazquez singled, Shane Brown doubled and Ryan Richardson flied out to score Vazquez. Robert Lara singled to score Brown and moved to third on a ground-rule double by Chris Duffy. Lara eventually scored on a fielding error.

Each team pushed across a pair of runs in the fifth inning. After UCF tied it up at 5-5, Chris Matesich produced a two-out, two-RBI single that scored Sutton and Maxie.

UCF had one more threat in them. After Lara and Kallstrom walked, Southern Miss went to its closer with two out in the eighth inning. Tyler Conn came in and retired the final four UCF batters on just eight pitches, getting Dwayne Bailey to fly out on the first pitch to end the eighth inning threat and then tossed only seven pitches to produce three outs in the ninth. In the process, he established a new Conference USA single-season record for saves with his 17th of the year.

Wade Weathers (2-1) earned the win in relief for Southern Miss, tossing 3.1 shutout innings with just one hit. Kyle Sweat (5-5) took the loss for UCF, allowing seven runs on 10 hits over 5.1 innings.

The Golden Eagles advance in the first round of the C-USA Championship for fourth straight year and the seventh time in eight years.

Southern Miss advances to face the winner of the Marshall-Tulane game at 7:30 p.m. CT on Thursday, while UCF will play the loser of the MU-Tulane matchup in Thursday's second elimination game at 12 30 p.m. CT.