DeKALB – NIU baseball lost a slugfest against Ball State University, as the Cardinals slugged four home runs, losing by a score of 13-10.
EARLY DEFICIT
The Huskies starting pitcher for the day, senior pitcher Dominic Hann, totaled three innings in the ball game, giving up four runs on four hits.
Senior pitcher Ryan Linkletter was the first Huskie arm out of the bullpen for the fourth inning, giving up five runs on four hits. Linkletter was unable to make it out of the fourth inning, finishing his day with a total of 0.2 innings pitched.
After the top half of the fourth inning concluded, the Huskies trailed Ball State by a score of 9-3.
QUICK OFFENSE
The Huskies scored all 10 of their runs in the third and fourth innings and were shut down the rest of the way.
NIU faced deficits of 4-0 after the top of the third inning and 9-3 after the top of the fourth inning but battled back to take a one-run lead in the bottom of the fourth.
Senior infielder Andre Demetral drove in the first run of the game for NIU, an RBI double in the third inning. Senior outfielder/catcher Colin Summerhill drove senior infielder Eric Erato in later that inning on an RBI single.
Freshman catcher Cooper Cohn drove in Demetral on a sacrifice fly to cap off the inning.
The Huskies went on to score seven runs in the bottom of the fourth to take a 10-9 lead, highlighted by senior infielder Aaron Harper’s three-run double.
This was the Huskies second straight game scoring double digit runs and the 10th time scoring double digits this season.
CARDINALS OUT-SLUG HUSKIES
Ball State hit four home runs in the game while the Huskies were unable to produce any runs via the long ball.
Ball State junior catcher Hunter Dobbins drove two balls over the fence and senior infielder Michael Hallquist and sophomore infielder Dylan Grego both finished the game with one.
Dobbins finished the game with six RBIs, the most among either team in Sunday’s contest.
Hallquist now sits in third place for home runs in the MAC with 17.
OFFENSIVE PRODUCTION
Demetral and Harper both finished the game with three RBIs, leading the charge for the Huskies.
Demetral also led the Huskies in hits for the game, along with Summerhill, going 2-for-4 with a walk.
“Andre (Demetral) is one of our best on-base guys,” said NIU baseball head coach Ryan Copeland via NIU Athletics. “We moved him up in the order because we felt we could get some more guys on base for Summerhill with him near the top of the order. He’s had good at-bats and he ended up having a good day today and a good series overall.”
Summerhill also collected two hits, raising his batting average on the season to .295.
Erato also had a productive day at the plate, going 1-for-3 with two runs scored and two walks. Erato now sits eight walks shy of NIU’s career walk record of 140, set by Jake Dunham in 2021.
“Both teams were desperate to take this series today,” Copeland said. “Ball State came out and were all over the barrel and got an early lead. We squandered some opportunities early before getting that big seven-spot. That takes a lot of grit and toughness to come back like we did, but unfortunately they scored the last four runs of the game.”
UP NEXT
The Huskies will be back in action at 3 p.m. Wednesday at Ralph McKinzie Field at Walt and Janice Owens Park against the University of St. Thomas. Live stats will be available via SIDEARM Stats and the game will be livestreamed on NIU All-Access.
