Rain fell over Blue Bell Park at Olsen Field for the majority of the game as the No. 25 Texas A&M Aggies (11-4, 0-0 SEC) defeated the Louisiana Tech Bulldogs (4-10, 1-2 C-USA) by a score of 6-5 Saturday afternoon.
The bulk of A&M’s offense came in the bottom of the fourth inning in which five runs crossed the plate.
Junior Patrick McLendon drove in the first run of the inning with an RBI single that allowed sophomore Logan Taylor to cross the plate. Juniors Cole Lankford, Logan Nottebrok, and sophomore Hunter Melton had RBI’s in the inning as well.
Lankford had an impressive day at the plate, going four-for-five on the day and scoring a run of his own to go along with his fourth inning RBI.
“I feel like we did our job and did what we needed to do,” Lankford said. “We got one more run than the other team and that’s what we needed to do in order to get the win. I felt great at the plate and found some holes. Some days you eat the bear and some days the bear eats you. I took a big bite.”
After scoring one run in the sixth and two in the seventh, Bulldogs redshirt senior Stephen Gandy hit a solo home run to left field off A&M sophomore A.J. Minter to cut the lead to 6-5.
Sophomore Andrew Vinson entered the game for the final two outs of the eighth inning striking out one of the two batters he faced and getting the Aggies out of the inning.
Senior closer Jason Jester notched his second save of the season Saturday – facing four batters and setting up the potential sweep of the Bulldogs Sunday.
Senior Parker Ray faced 21 batters in five innings in route to his second win of the season. Ray walked three and struck out one while giving up just two earned runs against the Bulldogs.
“I thought we showed a lot of toughness today,” said A&M head coach Rob Childress. “We were fantastic for five or six innings from an offensive standpoint. Parker Ray retired the first nine batters he faced and got us off to a great start and the bullpen did a nice job.”
There were a total of five errors in the game with four charged to Louisiana Tech. Only three of the six Aggie runs were earned.
Inclement weather concerns caused A&M officials to reschedule the first pitch from 6:35 p.m. to 1:05 p.m. Saturday.
“Wins are hard to come by,” said senior outfielder Krey Bratsen. “Especially with weather like this. You know you are going to have some mistakes in the field, but we made big plays when we needed to. Playing in this stuff is going to help us in the long run. We will definitely see it again.
The Aggies go for the sweep at 1:05 p.m. Sunday with sophomore Grayson Long taking the mound.