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COLUMBUS - The Columbus State University baseball team pulled off another exhilarating comeback, taking down Rollins 11-10 to complete the three-game sweep. The final game of the series took place at Burger King Stadium at Ragsdale Field.
With the Cougars and Tars tied at 10-apiece heading to the bottom of the ninth, CSU got the leadoff man on the base paths thanks to a single from
Matthew McDade. The freshman advanced to second on a sac-bunt putting him in scoring position for
Kendall Ford. Ford then delivered the clutch hit, sending one to the wall as McDade came home for the walk-off win. Columbus State has now won six games in a row, including back-to-back weekend sweeps of ranked opponents.
"It was a crazy day with the wind blowing which made things difficult for both teams," said head coach
Greg Appleton. "Once you pull a comeback a couple of times you really start to feel like no matter what scenario we're in that we've got a chance. It's good to see some of the young guys play an integral part of another comeback."
CSU found themselves in an 8-3 hole heading to the bottom of the sixth when the rally started to come together.
Dane Bullock hit a leadoff single which then saw
Chase Brown and
Grant Berry each getting hit by a pitch to load the bases with no outs. It was the freshman McDade then delivering the clutch double to bring in two runs making it a 8-5 game. Another single and an RBI-groundout would score two more runs as Columbus State climbed within one.
Rollins would respond though in the seventh scoring two runs to extend it back to a three-run lead. But the resiliency came through once again for CSU in the bottom of the 8th inning.
With runners on second and third,
Robert Brooks hit a sac-fly to pick up the RBI and another run came home on an obstruction call making it 10-9. With two outs and two on, Brown came to the plate in a similar scenario just one weekend ago against Saint Leo when he hit the game-leading grand slam in the 8th. Brown would come through once again, singling into right center to tie the game setting up the walk-off one inning later.
Columbus State actually jumped out to early leads at 1-0 and 3-1 thanks to two RBI-singles from Brooks in the first three innings.
McDade finished 3-for-5 at the plate, including the bases loaded double picking him up two RBI's while also scoring twice. Brooks went 2-for-3 with three RBI's while Ford finished 2-for-5 including two runs and two RBI's. Webb (3-for-4) and
Garrett Kirkwood (2-for-4) also finished with multi-hit games for the Cougars.
The Cougars will look to keep things rolling as they take on Montevallo next on Wednesday, Feb. 27. First pitch is scheduled for 4 p.m. at Burger King Stadium.
