FAYETTEVILLE -- No. 1 Arkansas defeated ORU 4-2 Thursday night at Baum-Walker Stadium in front of 9,401 fans.
The Razorbacks used six pitchers and got enough hitting to get another victory. ORU outhit the Hogs 9-6, but a big bottom half of the second inning proved to the difference. Kendall Diggs added a solo home run in the fifth for a 4-0 lead and then the Razorbacks held on to win. Dave Van Horn talked about the victory afterward.
"Quick game, not a lot of action, a lot of good pitching, a lot of strikes being thrown," Van Horn said. "The one inning where strikes weren’t thrown we took advantage of it and punched in three runs. Obviously when Kendall hit the home run it gives us a four-run lead. That’s kind of one of the magic numbers when you get to four. It’s a little more difficult.
"And it just seemed like we held on at the end. We had a chance in the seventh you know to just tack on one more run. But give credit to their pitcher. He struck our hitter out on three pitches and then we didn’t get the big hit."
In the bottom of the second, Peyton Holt walked to start the inning. Ross Lovich was then hit by a pitch. Parker Rowland sacrificed Holt to third and Lovich to second. Ty Wilmsmeyer then walked to load the bases with one out. Petyon Stovall singled to plate both Holt and Lovich. Stovall advanced to second base on wild pitch then scored on a single by Wehiwa Aloy. Diggs reflected back on his bat when he hit the home run.
"In the past week or so, I feel like I’ve been just missing my pitch, so I was looking for a fastball there," Diggs said. "Took the first one he threw me. He brought that one in a little bit, good thing it kept going through the wind. I wasn’t sure it was going to, but it worked out."
In the top of the seventh, David Herring doubled to start the inning. He advanced to third on a single by Alex Rodgers. Sam Thompson, pinch hitting for Kole Dudding then hit a sacrifice fly to get Herring across the plate to pull within 4-1.
In the top of the eighth, Elijah Rodriguez delivered with a one-out single. He advanced to second when Holden Breeze walked. After Kyle Booker flied out, Drew Stahl delivered a two-out single to plate Rodriguez.
After Rodriguez's single off Koty Frank, Arkansas' fifth pitcher on the night, Van Horn went to Gabe Gaeckle. He retired the only four hitters he faced, one in the eighth and then shut ORU down in order in the top of the ninth.
Colin Fisher (4-1) got the win. He worked 3.0 innings, allowed three hits, no runs, walked one and fanned four. Gaeckle earned his fourth save of the season. Arkansas also sent Will McEntire, Stone Hewlett and Dylan Carter to the mound in addition to Frank, Fisher and Gaeckle.
"Really good to see Fisher and Gaeckle, our young pitchers go out and pretty much pound the zone, throw a lot of strikes," Van Horn said. "And I thought McEntire came in and threw the ball really well. He wanted to get a couple of innings today. And Hewlett came in and got the one lefty out, got the righty pit, didn’t get the lefty out. We thought we better get Dylan in there and get him in a little more of a leverage situation. The ball was coming out of his hand good. They took a couple of good swings at him, but I was proud of him. He threw well.
"And then Koty Frank, you know, kind of a hard-luck pitcher. We had a fly ball to left field that probably should have been caught. They had a seeing-eye single. Had the infield playing to pull and the guy slaps one through the middle. But overall I thought our pitching did an outstanding job of making them earn everything. We had two walks on the day and that’s a winning formula if you’ll field the ball a little bit."
Braydon Sanford, the second ORU pitcher, took the loss. He went 2.2 innings, gave up three hits, three runs, all earned, walked three and struck out one.
Arkansas (14-2) will open SEC play on Friday when they host Missouri at 6:30 p.m. Both Saturday and Sunday the first pitch is set for 2 p.m. All three games can be streamed on the SEC Network+.
Photos Courtesy of Craven Whitlow CW3 Sports Action
