Trojans Drop Heartbreaker to Samford

Tuesday, April 6

Birmingham, Ala.

6 p.m.

Troy University

13-14

Samford

18-11

Troy

Samford

4/6/2021 9:57:00 PM | Baseball

Box Score

By: Troy Athletics Communications

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Troy dropped a heartbreaker via walk-off to in-state foe Samford Tuesday evening in Birmingham. Caleb Bartolero delivered a game-tying home run with two strikes in the top of the ninth, but the Trojans ultimately fell, 4-3, to the Bulldogs at Joe Lee Griffin Field.

Troy (13-14, 2-4 SBC) held Samford (18-11, 8-1 SoCon) to just three hits through eight innings, but three Bulldog singles in the ninth crossed the winning run. Bartolero's game-tying home run came after Mason Kenney recorded three huge strikeouts, all with the bases loaded, in the bottom of the eighth to keep the game within reach.

It was a group effort on the mound as Troy used six pitchers in the contest. Max Newton, Marquez Oates and Matt Snell combined for eight strikeouts and gave up just one hit in 5.1 innings. In total, the Trojan arms struck out 12 batters in the loss.

Troy tallied three hits, all with two outs, to open the game, highlighted by an RBI-single by Dalton Sinquefield to get the Trojans on the board first. Logan Cerny sent his 11^th home run of the season over the wall in left-center field in the third inning to give Troy a 2-0 lead.

A pair of early walks in the bottom of the sixth inning came back to bite the Trojans when Tyler McManus gave Samford the lead with a three-run homer.

Troy would struggle to get anything going offensively until Drew Frederic, representing the tying run at the time, reached base via walk before stealing second and advancing to third on a wild pitch. A strikeout eventually left Frederic stranded, however.

A Troy error in the bottom of the eighth squandered a double play opportunity and loaded the bases for Samford with no outs. Kenney then struck out three consecutive batters to get the Trojans out of the jam and keep the Trojans within striking distance.

With one swing of the bat, Bartolero tied the game with no outs and gave the Trojans new hope in the contest. A spectacular diving play from the Samford's Garrett Howe at second base robbed Clay Stearns of a base hit up the middle that would have placed the go-ahead run on first with one out.

Howe eventually hit the walk-off single on a good breaking pitch from Kenney to seal the win for the Bulldogs.

Kenney (1-2) was tagged with the loss after surrendering the deciding run in the ninth inning. Chase Isbell (2-1) was the pitcher of record for the Bulldogs.

Quotable – Head Coach Mark Smartt
"We played a little better tonight, but didn't get the result we were hoping for. Give Samford credit, they did some good work with the bats in the ninth against some quality pitches from Mason Kenney. We're not doing enough offensively to overcome the small mistakes we're making and win games. I like the way we played tonight; we just didn't do enough things to win the game. Disappointing end result but we're making strides to getting back to being a better ball club."

Notable

Logan Cerny hit his 11^th home run of the season, the most by any player in the Sun Belt Conference this season.
Lance Johnson made the 107th appearance of his career, the third most among all NCAA baseball players across all divisions.
Drew Frederic extended his career-long on-base streak to 36 games dating back to last season.
Caleb Bartolero made the start at first base in the contest and registered his fourth career home run.

Up Next
Troy returns to Riddle-Pace Field for a home conference series against Texas State. First pitch in the series-opener is set for Friday at 6 p.m.