Final Stats ARLINGTON, Texas – With a 6-4 lead heading into the bottom of the seventh, the Nicholls baseball team could not maintain its lead, eventually falling in 11 innings to the UT-Arlington Mavericks 6-7 Thursday night in Texas.

Nicholls (17-13, 6-7) falls in a series opener for only the second time this season, finishing the night with 15 hits behind a three-hit night by Philip Lyons, as Mike Barba, Michael LeGrange, Blake Bergeron, Austin Flores and Cody Duferene each finished with two. Hill's only hit of the night was the two-run bomb in the first, while Flores' in the second provided the Colonels with their second multi-home run game of the season.

Going up against a hot hitting team, starter Seth Webster pitched seven innings on the night, giving up six runs, five earned, on ten hits with just three strikeouts. Jordan McCoy pitched 1.1 innings of relief giving up just one hit, while Brad Delatte (0-1) pitched two strong innings to work out of some jams before UTA (19-11, 7-6) plated the final run of the game in the 11th.

After getting in a 0-2 hole, Barba walked to get on base in the top of the first inning. Lyons then singled to left center to put Colonels on first and second base with no outs. That proved to be disastrous for UTA as Hill took the first pitch he saw and drilled it off of the scoreboard in right field to give Nicholls a 3-0 lead.

UTA got one back in the top of the first, using two hits to score, but the Colonels used turned a double play to end the inning without giving up more with one left on.

Flores fouled a couple of pitches off in his at bat, but the fourth pitch he would see was the best, and Flores drilled a shot that easily cleared the left field fence for the first home run of his career and got the Colonels that run back going up 4-1 for the only action in the second.

A leadoff double almost became problematic for the Colonels in the bottom of the second, but Nicholls retired the next three batters to escape another inning without allowing any more runs to cross the plate.

With two outs, LeGrange hit his eighth double of the year to get into scoring position in the third. With two strikes Bergeron laced a single by the UTA third baseman, enough to get LeGrange home from second to put Nicholls up 5-1, before a line drive ended the two-out rally.

In the bottom of the third, Webster walked his first batter in the last 29 innings, but retired every batter in succession to get out of the inning.

A two-run single in the bottom of the fifth inning for UTA made the score 5-3, as a throwing error by Bergeron at third allowed another run to cross the plate to pull the Mavs within one at 5-4.

With momentum seemingly shifting to the Mavs, with two outs Barba doubled down the left field line in the seventh prompting a pitching change for UTA. Lyons then singled to right center field driving in Barba to give Nicholls and insurance run to go up 6-4. Lyons got caught stealing to end the inning with Hill at the plate.

With a runner on in the bottom of the seventh, the Colonels turned a double play to get out of the mess, but not before another single and home run by Preston Beck tied the game at 6-6 before a ground out ended the inning.

With one out in the 11th, Bergeron singled to left field, followed by another single by Flores to put both on. A towering shot that looked like it would be the clincher for the Colonels off of the bat of Dufrene hit the top of the wall and only loaded the bases for a single. Unfortunately, the Colonel rally would end there as the next two batters struck out to end the rally.

In the bottom half of the same inning, a hit batter, walk, and sacrifice bunt led to the walkoff single by Ryan Walker to end the game.

Game two of the series will begin at 6:30 p.m. Friday night in Arlington.