BRISTOL, Tenn. — Justin Millsaps went 4-for-5 including a game-winning two-run homer in the top of the ninth inning to lead the Tusculum University baseball team to an 8-6 win at King University Tuesday afternoon.
The Pioneers (4-10) recorded a season-high 16 hits in the contest while snapping a five-game losing streak.
Millsaps scored three runs and tallied two doubles to go along with his two-run blast which broke a 5-5 tie in the ninth.
Five Pioneers recorded multiple-hit outings including Millsaps career-high four base hits. Ryan Ortega, Caleb Webster, Ben Scartz and Max Schmarder had two hits apiece.
Tusculum scored four times in the third inning to take a 4-0 lead. TU opened the frame with four straight hits with only one of them leaving the infield. Webster drove in the first run with his infield single. Omar Carreras and Scartz followed with back-to-back sacrifice flies to extend the lead to 3-0. Schmarder closed out the inning with his two-out, RBI hit.
King wasted little time in answering as the Tornado (4-11) scored four times in their half of the third. King used four hits including Josh Nuno’s two-run double to knot the game at 4-4.
Tusculum retook the lead in the fifth when Millsaps led off with a double and scored on Webster’s ensuing double as TU went back in front 5-4. But in the bottom of the frame, King’s Levi Medford belted a solo homer to left field to level the score at 5-5.
In the top of the ninth, Ortega got aboard with a one-out single and came across to score on Millsaps two-run blast as the Pioneers led 7-5. Carreras would reach on a two-out double and Seth Sherman came aboard to pinch run. Scartz posted his second hit of the game with his infield single to move Sherman to third. Schmarder stepped up with his second hit of the afternoon to drive in Sherman with an insurance run to extend the lead to 8-5.
In the bottom of the ninth, TU reliever Mason Huffstickler retired the first two batters. But King would mount a two-out threat as Truman Roper hit a double down the left field line and scored on a TU throwing error to make it an 8-6 contest. Nuno followed with a base hit and moved to second on an errant throw as the Tornado had the tying runs at second and third. Pinch hitter Joey Amunategui III got good metal on Huffstickler’s offering but Schmarder hauled in the liner for the final out of the game.
Huffstickler (1-0) picked up the win in relief as he pitched the final two innings, where he allowed two hits, one unearned run, walked one and posted two strikeouts. King relief pitcher Royal Philo (1-3) suffered the loss.
The Tornado totaled 13 hits in the game with Nuno leading the way with his 3-for-5 performance.
Tusculum returns to action this weekend as they travel to Wingate University for a three-game South Atlantic Conference series beginning with Friday’s 6 p.m. opener.
