Final Stats Nicholls-Alcorn State Box Score

LORMAN, Miss. – Playing back-to-back nights, the Nicholls baseball team used a four-run sixth inning to pull ahead of the Alcorn State Braves for good, and got five more in the eighth to defeat the 2011 SWAC tournament champs 9-2 Wednesday night in Mississippi.

The Colonels (4-5) laced 14 total hits in the game, led by Jeremy Hill's three-hit, two-RBI night. Philip Lyons, Michael LeGrange and Beau Faulk ended the night with two hits, as Blake Bergeron, Mike Barba and Hill each finished with two RBI's each.

Mike Suk earned his first win as a Colonel, allowing only two runs on ten hits, striking out four in eight complete innings of work. Jacob Rodrigue in his first action in the red and grey retired all three batters he faced in order.

Nicholls scored all nine runs off of two Braves (1-6) pitchers, getting four runs off of starter Mike Peters who took the loss, and five off of Mundo Sanchez, who only lasted 1.2 innings.

The Braves scored a run off of the Colonels in the first inning, and it stayed that way for the next four innings. 

A leadoff single by Faulk in sixth was the turning point for the Colonels as he would advance to second, then third on an error by the pitcher. Leo Vargas then got hit by a pitch putting runners at the corners, then in scoring position by advancing to second on a wild pitch. After a fly out to the first baseman by Cody Dufrene, Barba doubled to bring in both Nicholls runners to take the 2-1 lead.

Barba then stole third and scored on another Alcorn State fielding error to go up 3-1. Following a strikeout, Lyons tripled to keep the inning alive for the Nicholls, and crossed the plate on a Hill single to make the score 4-1 with three innings left.

After another Braves pitching change, the floodgates opened as Nicholls loaded the bases after two errors and another hit batter led to a Hill groundout that scored Barba. With one swing of the bat, Bergeron drove in Lyons and Matt Richard to go up 7-1. Even after Bergeron got caught stealing to give Nicholls two outs in the inning, a single by LeGrange, double by Faulk and Vargas single, the Colonels found themselves up 9-1 and on their way to their second-straight victory.

Alcorn scored again in the bottom half of the inning, but could only muster that second run off of Suk in the game, before Rodrigue downed all three batters in the ninth.

The Colonels only committed one error for the second straight game, after committing nine all of last weekend.

The Colonels will now head to ULM for a three-game series against the Warhawks, with first pitch set for 6 p.m. at Warhawk Field in Monroe.