Photo by Davida Franklin from The Crimson White
By Brandon Mraz
The Crimson Tide started their three game home series with Stetson on Friday. The 10-4 Hatters came into Tuscaloosa with vengeance. The Hatters jumped out to a quick 2-0 lead in the second coming off the bats of Kyle Ball and Jackson Olsen. Kyle Ball would groundout to score an unearned run. This would bring Jackson Olsen to the plate to hit a solo homerun over the right field wall.
The Hatters took care of business on the defensive end and would strike again on the offensive side in the sixth. With the bases loaded Brandon Hylton would hit a sacrifice fly to move the runners and score one making it 3-0. Ball would come to the plate again with one out in the sixth and would also fly out to center field for a sacrifice fly to make the score 4-0.
The Crimson Tide had a difficult day at the plate due to the pitching of Stetson’s Nick Durgin, who would go on to get the win. Durgin pitched 8 innings and kept the Tide at bay for the first seven. Durgin pitched 8 innings, gave up 2 runs, 2 hits, and struck out 9.
The Crimson Tide would finally strike against Durgin in the ninth. Drew Williamson led the inning off with a single into left bringing Zane Denton to the plate. Denton hit a homerun to right field to bring the game to 4-2. Stetson would bring in Danny Garcia to pitch and after a single by Owen Diodati and a double by Andrew Pinckney, Stetson shut down the comeback and won the game 4-2.
The Crimson Tide will be back on Saturday to try to tie the series and get a much-needed win in their last home series before the start of SEC play.
