NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Missouri State relied on a trio of home runs and five innings of shutdown relief from its bullpen to earn a 6-4 decision over Lipscomb in 11 innings Saturday at Dugan Field. Drew Millas’s one-out homer to right-center in the top of the 11th inning snapped a 4-4 tie and ignited a two-run rally that helped secure the Bears’ third-straight come-from-behind victory.
Millas, who logged his first three-hit game as a Bear in the victory, unloaded on the first pitch he saw from Kyle Kemp for his first career home run that handed Missouri State (5-1) the lead for good. Millas’s go-ahead blast was the third Bears homer of the game, after Jake Burger and Jeremy Eierman each went deep as part of a three-run sixth that erased a two-run deficit and gave MSU its first lead of the day.
Alex Jefferson’s two-out double chased home Jack Duffy with a second MSU tally in the decisive 11th-inning rally, and Bryan Young finished another standout performance by the Bears’ bullpen by stranding a pair of Lipscomb (4-2) baserunners in scoring position with a game-clinching strikeout for his school-record 29th career save.
Young, who recorded his second save in as many days in Nashville, issued a one-out walk to Zeke Dodson before Jake Perry singled. But the senior All-American induced a chopper to first for the second out, then blew a 2-2 pitch past Von Watson for the final out.
Trey Turner (2-0) provided the heavy lifting for the Bears’ bullpen corps, working 4.0 innings in relief of starter Jordan Knutson, over which he torched the Bisons lineup with a career-best eight strikeouts. Knutson fanned nine LU hitters over his 6.0 frames, as the three MSU hurlers combined for 18 punchouts, just one shy of the program record of 19 K’s, recorded on March 23, 1967 vs. Oklahoma Christian.
The eventual Missouri State victory—the Bears’ third in a row this week after trailing by at least two runs—appeared to be in jeopardy through the middle innings, as the Bisons touched up Knutson for three runs on four hits in the fourth. After three scoreless innings by both starting pitchers to open the contest, Lee Solomon jumped on Knutson’s first offering of the fourth and drove a two-base hit into the left-center field gap to set the tone. A fly ball to deep right off the bat of Dodson moved the runner to third, before Perry’s chopper past first brought in Solomon with the first run of the game.
Knutson recovered momentarily to strike out Cade Sorrells, but Von Watson doubled home Perry, and Tevin Symonette singled up the middle to plate the third LU run of the inning.
Held in check by LU starter Jeffrey Passantino through the first four frames, the Bears turned a one-out single from Millas into their first true scoring threat of the day in the fifth. Duffy coaxed a walk to put two runners on base, before Hunter Steinmetz lined a run-scoring single to right to cut the MSU deficit to 3-1.
Passantino bounced back to fan Jefferson for the second out, before catcher Jeffrey Crisan caught Steinmetz leaning off first for an inning-ending pickoff that stranded the potential tying runs with Burger at the plate.
But the Bears’ All-American third baseman led off the sixth with long drive over the left-center field wall that made it a 3-2 game. Following a walk to Justin Paulsen, Eierman lifted Passantino’s first offering over the fence in right for a two-run blow that gave the Bears a 4-3 edge.
Knutson worked a scoreless sixth, capping his day with the final two of his nine strikeouts, before Turner delivered a perfect seventh in his first inning of duty.
Michael Gigliotti’s leadoff homer in the eighth knotted the score at 4-4, marking the first earned run allowed by the MSU bullpen in 19.2 combined innings this season. But that would be the Bisons’ lone baserunner against Turner, who struck out at least two batters in all but one of his four innings and finished his outing by fanning the side in the 10th before handing the ball to Young with a two-run lead.
In addition to Millas’s career day, four Bears logged two-hit games and drove in at least one run as part of a season-high 13-hit attack. Burger, Jefferson and Steinmetz all went 2-for-6 with an RBI, while Eierman finished his day 2-for-5 with two RBIs.
Up next, the Bears will conclude play at the Mule Mix Classic Sunday, when they face Middle Tennessee in a Noon game at Reese Smith, Jr. Field in Murfreesboro.
