BOWLING GREEN, Ky. — Visiting Louisiana Tech took an early eight-run lead against WKU Baseball, and the Hilltoppers lost by a score of 13-4 on Saturday afternoon. Steven Kraft hit his 10th career homerun on The Hill, a three-run shot in the eighth inning.
The Bulldogs scored two runs in the first and three in the second off WKUÂ starter Paul Kirkpatrick, then three in the third against reliever Devon Loomis. Two of the tallies in the third were unearned, but the damage was done for an 8-0 lead.
Nick Brunson gave the Hilltoppers their first hit of the day when he painted the right-field line with a double with one out in the third. Kevin Lambert followed with a ground-ball single over the pitcher's mound on the next pitch to put a run on the board for WKU (20-22, 10-10), making the score 8-1 while extending his hit streak to three games.
Michael Darrell-Hicks and Jeff Ciocco helped the Hilltoppers post scoreless innings in the fourth, fifth and sixth as the score stayed stagnant during that time.
Ciocco started the seventh with 4.2 scoreless frames, but after back-to-back hits allowed his first run of the year across five appearances. Louisiana Tech (30-15, 14-6) added three more in the eighth against lefty Troy Newell to make it 12-1, then Malcolm Grady came in to relieve and got the final three outs of the frame.
Bulldog starter Logan Robbins went seven innings and allowed one run on four hits; the lefty threw 103 pitches - 66 strikes - before giving way to Ben Stiglets to begin the eighth.
In that frame, Luke Brown and pinch hitter Chase Larsen singled to start the inning. With one out on an 0-2 pitch, Kraft jumped on a breaking ball from the righty and sent it over the fence in left-center for his second long ball of the year.
Although it was the 10th homerun of the senior's WKU career, it was only his third at Nick Denes Field. It had been more than two years since Kraft homered in a home game, dating back to a two-run shot that scored Danny Hudzina on April 22, 2016, against UTSA.
Oddly enough, his first career homerun in Bowling Green also came against Louisiana Tech; it was a solo shot on April 9, only 13 days prior. After hitting six long balls in his sophomore season of 2016, Kraft's previous three homeruns had been at Eastern Kentucky; a pair on March 8, 2017, and then another earlier this season on March 27.
Topper Quotes
"We had a great win last night, a big win for us on a Friday night. Great to see what Steven Kraft did late in the game, but today obviously we didn't play well enough to win. Tomorrow becomes an important game, it's 'Championship Sunday' and we look forward to it." — Head coach John Pawlowski
Up Next
WKU and Louisiana Tech will face off in the rubber match on Sunday at 1 p.m. The Hilltoppers are 5-1 in the final game of Conference USA series this season, with the lone loss coming at No. 13 Southern Miss. Lefty Logan Bailey is expected to throw for the Bulldogs, while the host's starter remains TBA at this time.
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