Johnson City Times

Wes Reynolds' bases-loaded triple highlighted a 4-run, fourth inning as Tusculum rallied to an 11-5 South Atlantic Conference baseball victory over Limestone Friday at Pioneer Park.

The Pioneers (15-5, 6-1 SAC) trailed three times including 5-4 heading to the bottom of the fourth. TU utilized three hits including Reynolds second triple of the year.

Ben Scartz and Will Samuelson had three hits each for Tusculum, while Limestone's Peter Adams led all hitters as he went 4-for-4 with a pair of doubles.

Tusculum starter Luke Absher (3-0) overcame a rough four innings to get started, but settled down and retired seven of the final nine batters he would face before handing the game over to Trejen Fox-Birdwell. Fox Birdwell blanked the Saints for the final three innings to secure his first career save.

Limestone (7-12, 2-5 SAC) jumped out to a 2-0 lead as Gavin Troyer and Noah Love led off the game with back-to-back doubles. Troyer would score on Zach O'Malley's sacrifice fly and Love touched the plate on Dylan Shugan's RBI single.

The Pioneers got a run back when lead-off batter Tyler Ranel blasted a towering shot to left for his third homer of the season. TU tied the game in the second when Murphy Flood led off with a walk, stole second and scored on Samuelson's RBI single to right.

The Saints regained the lead in the third when O'Malley hit a solo home run to center field. Shugan reached on an error and later scored on Wyatt Stone's base hit.

Back came the Pioneers to tie it at 4-4 with a pair of runs in the bottom of the third. Scartz and Christian Oretega reached on one-out single. Flood drove in Scartz with his single and Reynolds flied out to right field to bring home Ortega.

In the top of the fourth, Adams got aboard with a double, his second of the game and fourth of the year. Love drove him in with his second double of the contest and seventh of 2023.

Limestone pitcher James Deloatch retired the first two batters of the fourth. Scartz followed with a single, moved to second when Ortega was hit by a pitch and a walk to Flood loaded the bases for Reynolds. Reynolds lifted a deep fly ball that caromed off the wall in center to clear the bases and give TU an 8-5 lead. Reynolds scored on a balk to make it a 9-5 game.

Zane Keener belted a two-out solo home run in the fifth and TU tacked on two more runs in the seventh thank to Scartz and his two-run single.

Abshur went six innings, scattered 10 hits, allowed five runs, four earned, walked one and struck out six in his 105-pitch performance. Fox-Birdwell pitched a one-hit shutout for his three innings as he walked two and fanned two.

Tusculum finished the game with 12 hits, while Limestone accounted for 11 hits.

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