DANVILLE, Ky. – Tonight's matchup between Centre baseball and Birmingham-Southern featured two of the three Southern Athletic Association squads receiving votes in the most recent d3baseball.com poll. In a thriller that required extra innings, the Colonels walked off with a 11-10 victory to take the first game of the series.
 
GAME HIGHLIGHTS
 
- The opening stages of the game belonged to the visiting Panthers, who connected early and often, jumping out to a 6-0 lead in the first three innings.
- Centre's offense got hits in the first two innings, but finally converted them to runs in the bottom of the third. Evan Weyler and Ben Prather led off with consecutive base hits. With two outs, a pair of clutch singles from Chase Austin and Ayden Lohr cut the deficit to 6-2.
- In the bottom of the fourth, Centre put two men on when Connor Jackson singled and Karson Thompson reach on an error. Prather smacked a deep fly ball near the scoreboard to make it a 6-5 game.
- The Panthers homered to lead off the fifth and then added another run to regather themselves and increase the lead to 8-5.
- The Colonels got another run on the board in the sixth, putting runners on the corners thanks to base hits by Weyler and Prather. A BSC error allowed Weyler to cross the plate to make it 8-6.
- After allowing a pair of unearned runs in the top of the seventh, the Colonels got the runs back in their half of the inning as Lohr ripped a double to left and Jamie Laframboise belted one over the big wall in left field to cut the margin in half to 10-8.
- Michael Lynch kicked off a Centre rally in the eighth with a base hit. Josh Cunningham then lined a double down the left field line that allowed speedy pinch runner Carson Mire to score all the way from first to make it 10-9. Austin walked and Cunningham stole third to put runners on the corners. Lohr bunted to the pitcher and Cunningham slid underneath the tag at the plate for the tying run.
- The game moved to the tenth as Cunningham led off with a sharp grounder that deflected off the shortstop for a base hit. He then stole second and Robert Monaco lifted a blooper that dropped into no man's land. After intentionally walking Lohr and recording an out, BSC faced Jackson, who hit a high chopper to third. The attempted force throw sailed over the catcher's glove, allowing Cunningham to cross the plate for the winning run.
 
INSIDE THE BOX SCORE
 
- The Colonels finished with 21 hits on the night, led by career highs of five from Lohr and four each from Weyler and Prather.
- Zach Heavern picked up the victory after allowing just one hit in 2.2 innings of scoreless relief work.
- Centre has now come back from a six-run deficit in each of the last two games, representing the largest comebacks of the season.
 
NEXT UP
 
Centre baseball will wrap up its series with BSC with a Saturday doubleheader.