Jim Mashek

WESTERN WILL PLAY HOST TO SURGING UK SQUAD ON TUESDAY EVENING

First-year Western Kentucky University baseball coach Marc Rardin had a message for his squad upon their arrival at WKU’s Nick Denes Field on Sunday morning.

It was pretty simple.

“You can’t get swept,” Rardin said after senior left-hander Devyn Terbrak guided the Hilltoppers to a steely 5-2 victory over a talented Louisiana Tech squad. “(The victory) was big, in so many ways.”

Terbrak, a senior left-hander from Perryville, Missouri, took the mound after Louisiana Tech took a pair of one- or two-run games on Saturday. The Bulldogs (now 12-12 overall, 3-3 in Conference USA) defeated WKU 5-3 in the first game before holding off a late rally to slip past the Hilltoppers 3-2 in the nightcap.

The Tops had no such letdown on Sunday.

“Everyone stayed locked in, the whole game,” Terbrak said.

Terbrak scattered six hits over eight-plus innings, before yielding to WKU closer C.J. Weins after surrendering a leadoff single from the Bulldogs’ Logan McLeod. Weins induced a double-play ball from Tech’s cleanup man, Dalton Davis, erasing the base runner, before striking out the Bulldogs’ Jorge Corona to end the game.

“Devyn was at 85 pitches. We were going to see him start the ninth (inning),” Rardin said. “He was deserving of that kind of applause, that kind of ovation, coming off the field. C.J. was huge.

“We still left too many guys on base.”

Eleven, to be exact.

The Hilltoppers’ Tristan Garcia, a slick-fielding second baseman, continued to provide big hits at the plate. Garcia, WKU’s cleanup man, had an RBI single on an infield hit in the fourth.

Western took a 2-0 lead on Drew Reckart’s two-run home run in the bottom of the first inning, before the Bulldogs tied the game at 2 in the top of the fourth inning.

Western answered, immediately.

“This game meant a lot,” Garcia said. “Down 2-0 in the series, Coach (Rardin) preaches the will to fight. You can see the energy in the dugout.”

WKU center fielder Ty Crittenberger, the Tops’ leadoff man, delivered a solo home run, a towering shot to left field, to put the home team in front 5-2 in the bottom of the eighth.

Crittenberger went 3-for-4 with three runs scored in the game. Reckart had two hits, including the aforementioned home run in the first.

WKU gets a big-time opportunity on Tuesday evening, when the HIlltoppers (16-9 overall, 2-4 in Conference USA) play host to the No. 22 University of Kentucky Wildcats. UK (21-3, 5-1 in the SEC) took two of three games on the road this weekend at the University of Alabama.

I’ll have a comprehensive look at WKU baseball either late tonight or early tomorrow morning. Gotta catch the University of Texas-Miami game in the NCAA Tournament this evening.

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