With the win, the Hilltoppers swept the Bruins in a home-and-home for the second-straight season. WKU has won nine of the past 11 games in the head-to-head series.
The Hilltoppers' first two hitters went down in the first inning, but right fielder Jake Sanford was hit by a pitch and designated hitter Jack Wilson worked a walk to bring up Swiney. The St. Louis, Mo., native lifted a high fly ball to left-center field that got caught up in a strong wind blowing out and just cleared the fence at E.S. Rose Park.
Constantine's long ball came after second baseman Nick Brunson and catcher Collin Hopkins started a scoring threat in the top of the fourth. After the WKU lineup circled around to the top of the order, left fielder hit home Brunson with a single to left field and that brought up the Huntsville, Ala., native. Wind or not, his deep drive to left field was destined to clear the fence.
The Hilltoppers added one apiece in the sixth and seventh frames to extend their lead to a game-high mark of 9-2, but the Bruins chipped away with three unearned runs in the next two innings to bring the score within four.
After Sanford and Wilson got on ahead of Swiney once again to lead off the ninth, the freshman hit repeat on his track from the first frame and sent a homerun out to left-center field. This one was no wall-scraper, as the center fielder entered his celebratory trot soon after connecting to give WKU a 12-5 advantage.
The Bruins added to their run total in the bottom of the ninth, with Hunter Holland's second two-run homerun of the game with zero outs. After another base hit, in came righty Jacob Green from the bullpen to strike out the next batter, and then induce a game-ending 4-6-3 double play.
The 12-7 victory brought the Hilltoppers back to a .500 overall mark for the season, with their record at 17-17-1.
Topper Notes
- Each team had three homeruns on the day; WKU with three three-run long balls and Belmont with three two-run shots of their own.
- Starter Jeff Ciocco allowed one of those homeruns to Grayson Taylor in the second inning, but otherwise posted scoreless frames in the first and third. The Blue Anchor, N.J., native struck out four after coming into the game with three punch outs in 11.2 innings pitched on the season. In two appearances against the Bruins over the past eight days, the junior righty pitched 7.1 frames and allowed only six hits, two walks and two runs.
- Reliever Collin Lollar earned the win by pitching perfect fourth and fifth frames. He struck out three —throwing 16-of-23 pitches for strikes — and did not allow a ball to leave the infield.
- Relievers Eric Crawford and Bailey Sutton combined to complete the sixth and seventh innings. The righties allowed three hits, one walk and the three unearned runs but struck out six — three apiece.
- Swiney's two homeruns and six runs batted in are both the most by a Hilltopper not named Sanford this year. He is the first freshman to hit two long balls in a game since Kevin Lambert and Wyatt Featherston each hit a pair at Austin Peay on April 25, 2017. Since his slash line hit a season-low of .230/.314/.338 on March 23, Swiney has used the past 14 games to push it up to a .256/.338/.403 mark.
Topper Quotes
- "To give our team a chance to win today we had to go out and win the free-base war. We walked only three guys and our offense had six walks and was hit by four pitches. We used a number of pitchers, they battled and filled up the strike zone and I'm proud of what they did today." — Head coach John Pawlowski.
- "The conditions up here are conducive to scoring runs. Jackson Swiney had some really good, quality at-bats today and Richard Constantine continue to do a great job for us. Up-and-down the lineup, the team competed as they always do offensively." — Head coach John Pawlowski.
- "The first one was kind of a wall-scraper, but I definitely got the second one; it felt good ... I think my approach is a lot better than earlier in the season. When I was going through the rough patch I was swinging at pitches out of the zone and now I'm just feeling a lot better." — Freshman Jackson Swiney.
Up Next
WKU hosts Conference USA foe Florida Atlantic for a three-game series at Nick Denes Field from April 19-21. The Friday-to-Sunday set will have first pitch times of 5 p.m., 1 p.m. and 1 p.m., respectively. The Owls improved to 25-11 overall after defeating UCF on Tuesday evening by a score of 5-3. The club boasts a 12-3 league record to top the standings while the Hilltoppers' 8-6-1 mark stands fifth.
