Spencer Brickhouse had three hits and three RBI including a homer to help lead ECU to an 8-3 opening day victory over Western Carolina at Clark-LeClair Stadium Friday afternoon.
“Anytime you hit a home run it’s big but when it’s two strikes that’s kind of a momentum shift. We were down 1-0 and I thought it loosened up our guys a little bit,” said ECU head coach Cliff Godwin, “I was really impressed with the toughness of our at-bats the entire night. A ton of guys had really good at-bats.”
Trey Benton went six innings and gave up one earned run in moving to 1-0 with the victory for ECU while Tristan Baker went four and a third innings giving up six earned runs on six hits in absorbing the loss for the Catamounts to fall to 0-1.
“I don’t think it was his best stuff. Western is really good offensively. They really go up there and attack the fast ball and if you make a mistake they’re going to make you pay for it so for him to go out there and give up just two runs I thought was a really good start for us. The entire pitching staff, Davis (Kirkpatrick) coming in getting us out of a jam, (Alec) Burleson pitching for two innings and Sam (Lanier) closing it out.”
Andrew Bullock got the Catamounts on the scoreboard in the first inning when he doubled to right field scoring Matthew Koehler.
In the bottom of the second inning Spencer Brickhouse homered to right. Then Brady Lloyd’s single to center scored Connor Litton and a Turner Brown sac fly brought Dusty Baker home to give the ECU a 3-1 lead.
Western Carolina struck back in the fourth when Caleb Robinson’s home run to left field cut the Pirate lead to one at 3-2.
The ECU lead expanded to 7-2 in the bottom of the fourth frame when singles from Brickhouse and Alec Burleson along with a Bryant Packard sac fly extended the Pirates lead to five.
Jake Washer’s pop fly in the sixth inning allowed Dwanya Williams-Sutton to score in the sixth inning to expand the Pirates’ lead to six at 8-2.
The Catamounts got on the scoreboard in the eighth when Luke Robinson’s single to left scored Cam Biaquiere to cut the ECU lead to five.
The Pirates will take on the Catamounts in the second game of the weekend series Saturday afternoon. The first pitch is at 2 o’clock.
