CLAREMORE, Okla. – Northwestern Oklahoma State University baseball was unable to overcome and early offensive barrage by Rogers State Tuesday as the Rangers dropped the midweek contest for the Hillcats, 11-5.
Northwestern (19-15, 9-11) will look forward to the weekend when they head to Russellville, Arkansas for a big conference series at Arkansas Tech. The Rangers and Wonder Boys will open the series Friday at 6 p.m., followed by a doubleheader Saturday afternoon beginning at 1 p.m.
The Rangers are currently one game out of the sixth and final Great American Conference tournament spot.
In Tuesday's game at Rogers State, the Hillcats jumped on the Rangers early with a 2-0 lead after the first inning. However, the Rangers responded in the top of the second with four runs of their own to take the lead.
Johnnuelle Ponce and Justin Bundy started the second in by getting on base. Bryce Donovan then stepped in and hit the ball to third, but the fielder misplayed the ball with allowed Ponce to score from second best for the first Northwestern run.
Ponce finished the game with three hits.
Two batters later, Brock Randels came to the plate and sent the ball to the center field wall to score both Bundy and Donovan to give the Rangers a 3-2 lead. Luis Cintron followed Randels with the third Ranger hit of the inning and Daschal Johnson drove the fourth run as Randels scored on a sacrifice fly.
After they plated a run in the home half of the second, the Hillcats took the lead for good with three in the third. RSU added two in the fourth and three in the fifth for their 11-run total.
Rafferty Brown and Rafael Lara pitched the final three innings for the Rangers and only allowed two hits during that span. In just his second appearance of the season, Brown didn't allow a hit and struck out a batter in two innings of work.
Cintron picked up the final RBI of the game for the Rangers in the top of the ninth with a sacrifice fly to center to score Colton Whitehouse, who had reached with a leadoff single before moving to third on a double to left center off the bat of Marques Paige.
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