March 18, 2008

JACKSON – Junior outfielder Hunter Owen homered twice and drove in six runs and senior shortstop Hunter Abrams went 4-for-6 with three RBIs and his first home run of the season to record his 200th career hit as Millsaps College outlasted No. 21 Illinois Wesleyan, 21-16, on a windy Tuesday evening at Twenty Field.

Abrams becomes just the sixth player in Millsaps history to surpass the 200-hit milestone and the 20th in the history of the SCAC, delivering an RBI-single in the sixth inning to score Jeremy Aliff. He joins Jason Hadley (236), Stuart Phillips (228), Matt Yglesias (214), Mike Highfill (206) and Brandon Page (205).

IWU (2-4) started the season with a pair of wins but have dropped four-straight since then, surrendering 21 runs and 19 hits to a Millsaps team that has won 10 of its last 12 games.

In a "hitters ballpark" with nearly 25 mph winds blowing straight out to center, Millsaps (16-7, 2-2 SCAC) plated two runs in both the first and third innings to take an early 4-1 lead, scoring 10 in the decisive fifth frame after the Titans retook the lead at 5-4 to eventually hold on for the 5-run win after IWU scored 11 runs over the final four innings.

The Majors brought 14 batters to the plate in their 10-run fifth inning, using six hits and three home runs in the frame from Abrams, Owen and senior Derrik Boland off Titans starter Alex Tosi and reliever Geoff Page to blow the game wide open.

The Titans rallied for two runs in the sixth, eighth and ninth innings and scored five in the seventh off three hits, a two-RBI double from Mike Cunningham and a three-run homer from Tim Marzec to make the game interesting in the final four innings.

Senior southpaw Travis Bogue (5-2) was credited with the win for Millsaps after tossing 3.0 innings in relief of starter John David Childs, while Tosi was hit with the loss for IWU in 4.2 innings of work to fall to 0-1 on the year.

Millsaps was led offensively by Owen with six RBIs on a 4-for-5 night, while Boland, Abrams, Russ Boyd and Ronnie Wheat each recorded multiple RBIs. The Titans were led by Ricky Angel who went 2-for-5 with five runs driven in and a home run.

The Majors will continue a 12-game homestand on Tuesday, March 25 at 6 p.m., hosting NAIA-foe Belhaven College in the Cowboy Maloney Trophy Series. The Blazers are 3-0 in the series, while Millsaps is 2-1 and MS College is 0-4.