TAHLEQUAH, Okla. – The Northeastern State baseball team handed No. 13 Central Missouri its first series loss of the entire 2016 season.
 
The RiverHawks (23-18, 17-14 MIAA) defeated the MIAA-leading Mules (27-12, 25-7 MIAA) 10-6 Sunday afternoon at Rousey Field to take the series two games to one. UCM had won all 10 of its series entering this weekend.
 
The victories kept NSU in seventh place in the conference standings with seven games remaining in the regular season. The RiverHawks also moved within a half game of fifth place.
 
Northeastern State got on the board in the bottom of the first when junior Bryce Davenport hit a sacrifice fly to plate senior Shane Bridges. Bridges drew a four-pitch walk to open the game and advanced to second on a balk. He later moved up 90 feet on a groundout and scored on the sac fly.
 
UCM quickly responded when Jackson Schnurbusch roped an RBI single to left field in the second to bring around Derek Cornell. The Mules added two more runs on a Cornell homer in the fourth and Blake Wilfong used a fifth-inning leadoff triple to push their lead to 4-1. He scored on a sacrifice fly by Matt Elliott.
 
Sophomore Michael Rhea led off the bottom of the fifth with a single up the middle and took second on a wild pitch. He scored on a double down the left field line by senior Justin Burgess, who later scored on an RBI single from senior Charles Sims. Junior Dakota Woods tied the game at 4-4 with a double that plated Sims.
 
The RiverHawks took a narrow 5-4 lead after senior Cody Begovich hit a laser over the right field fence to lead off the sixth, and they pounded out five more runs in the seventh to take an insurmountable 10-4 advantage.
 
The Mules got two back in the top of the eighth on an inconsequential home run from Bennett Oliver, but they would do no further damage to the scoreboard.
 
NSU outhit UCM 10-8, and five different members of the team finished with two hits. Sims had an RBI and two runs scored, while Rhea posted two RBI and two runs. Burgess drove in three runs and scored once, Woods had two RBI and one run and Begovich scored twice and had an RBI on his solo homer.
 
Junior Daniel Faulk (1-1) earned his first win on the mound for Northeastern State. He gave up four runs (three earned) on just five hits in 6.0 stellar innings of work. He walked and struck out a pair. Junior Zach Poehl threw 1.1 innings of relief and allowed two runs on three hits. True freshman James Cowell tossed the final 1.2 innings and did not allow a base runner.
 
NSU touched up UCM starter Carlos D'Armas (2-2) for five runs on six hits in five innings. D'Armas walked four and only struck out three. Reliever Ross Juliana entered the game with a 2.12 ERA, but the RiverHawks touched him up for three runs in just 1.0 inning to raise his earned run average to 3.50. He only allowed one hit, but he also issued three walks. Central Missouri then brought on Andy Muehlberger, who had yet to give up a run this entire season. He suffered the same fate as Juliana, as the green and white tagged him for two runs on three hits in just one frame.
 
Cornell and Matt Safranek were the only Mules with multiple hits, as they both finished with two. Cornell and Oliver both scored twice and drove in two runs.
 
Northeastern State will now head to Edmond, Oklahoma, for the final game of a midweek series with Central Oklahoma. First pitch is scheduled for 2 p.m. April 27.

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