April 17, 2010

Box Score

CONWAY, Ark.- Junior lefty Clint Dempster threw his first 9.0 inning complete game on Saturday, limiting Central Arkansas (11-23, 4-13 Southland Conference) to just one earned run on five hits and two walks while striking out eight to lead the Nicholls State University baseball team (16-18, 7-10 Southland) to a 5-3 win over the Bears on Saturday.

Dempster overpowered the Bears early on, facing just two batters over the minimum through the first 5.0 innings.

With Dempster cruising through the UCA lineup, the Nicholls offense got to work. Beau Faulk singled home Adam Miley with a two-out double to stake Nicholls to a 1-0 in the first.

The Colonels extended their lead with a three-run fourth. Brady Bourque and Steven Gauthe each drove in a run with an RBI single and Chase Jaramillo scored on wild pitch as Nicholls went up 4-0 after four innings.

The Bears got on the board with an RBI groundout in the sixth to make it 4-1, but Nicholls reclaimed a four-run advantage in the top of the seventh on a Keith Kulbeth RBI. After trading zeroes with the Bears in the eighth, the Colonels took a 5-1 lead into the bottom of the ninth.

After retiring the first two batters in the ninth, the Bears extended the inning on a Colonel error and Drew Sullivan followed with a two-run homer to make it 5-3. Dempster responded by striking out his eighth batter of the afternoon to end the game.

The win snapped a four-game losing streak for the Colonels and inched Nicholls closer to its goal of 20 overall wins and 10 conference victories. Nicholls remains four overall wins shy of its first 20-win season since 2005, and the Colonels need three more conference victories for their first ten-win Southland Conference season since 2002. The Colonels remain just two overall wins and two conference wins shy of matching their 2009 overall (18) and conference (9) win totals.