JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. - Carson-Newman (18-24, 13-14 SAC) secured a spot in next week's South Atlantic Conference baseball tournament with a 6-2 win over Anderson (17-32, 9-18 SAC) Friday afternoon. They entered Saturday's doubleheader in fourth place hoping to improve their seed in the post-season.

That proved to be a difficult task as the Trojans took both games Saturday, winning the first game 8-6 in 10 innings and rallying late to win game two, 6-5. As such, the Eagles enter is the six seed in the league tournament.  They finished tied for fifth in the standings with LMU, but the Railsplitters took two of three from the Eagles to win the tiebreaker.  

C-N head coach Tom Griffin said that while his team hit the ball well in the two games, the pitching struggled.

"We have been pitching great all year and that has been our forte all season but today, the pitchers didn't do a good enough job," Griffin said. "We have been able to score some runs and the offense has been playing better lately but there were too many balls in the middle of the plate today and we fell behind too many hitters. That was very uncharacteristic,"

Game one: Anderson 8, Carson-Newman 6 (10 innings)

In game one, Anderson leadoff hitter Brett Cash had a monster game as he hit two home runs, his first two of the season, and drove in four runs to lead the Trojans to a, 8-6 win in 10 innings.

After the Trojans scored two runs through the first two and a half innings, Carson-Newman took advantage of two errors by Anderson in the bottom of the third. Anderson starter Erick Sanderson had retired eight consecutive batters but Evan Kirkpatrick (Jefferson City, Tenn.) reached base on an error. That seemed to open the flood gates for the Eagles.

After Peter Rajkovich (Stockton, Calif.) had singled and advanced to second on a wild pitch, Brandon Roberts (Davie, Fla.) brought both runners home with a single to left field. Evan Jurjevic (New Carlisle, Ind.) plated Roberts to give C-N a 4-2 lead.

The lead would not last for very long, however, as Cash blasted a towering two-run home run to left field to tie the game at 4-4. The Eagles took a 5-4 lead in the sixth when Cody Fox (Seymour, Tenn.) led off the inning with a double to center field. After moving to third on a ground-out by Bryan Everhart (Greeneville, Tenn.), C-N head coach Tom Griffin dialed up the perfect call as Kirkpatrick dropped a squeeze bunt as Fox raced home from third.

Anderson retook the lead in the seventh inning when Josh Hickman drew a lead-off walk and Steven Cooper tagged a two-run round-tripper to right to put the Trojans up 6-5. The Eagles saw an excellent chance to tie the game slip away in the bottom of the seventh as Roberts reached on an error and Jurjevic walked but the Eagles could not get either of them home.

C-N did tie the game in the eighth when Joe Tipton (Dandridge, Tenn.) had a pinch-hit walk and scored on Rajkovich's single to left field. But Anderson would score the winning runs in the top of the 10th inning when Cash hit his second two-run home run of the day to produce the 8-6 final.

Anderson reliever Kyle Francis (3-3) picked up the win as he pitched the final three innings of the game and allowed only one hit. Sanderson did well as a starter as he went seven innings, gave up only one earned run, walked four and struck out seven.

Carson-Newman reliever Ryan Fillers took the loss to fall to 1-3 on the season. Despite that, Fillers etched his name in the history books as the Greeneville, Tenn.-native became the all-time leader in appearances at Carson-Newman with 84.

Game two: Anderson 6, Carson-Newman 5

Anderson rallied with four runs in the sixth inning to take game two 6-5. Trojan pitcher Thomas Goodman threw a dandy against the Eagles, picking up a complete game win to improve to 4-4 on the season. He gave up five runs, eight hits, walked only one and fanned three Eagle batters. C-N starter Quinton Yocum (Cable, Ohio) was tagged with the loss as he fell to 2-2 despite the fact he had nine strikeouts and two walks.

The visitors from South Carolina scored first when Hickman walked, stole second, advanced to third on a wild pitch and scored on Sanderson's single to left in the first inning. Carson-Newman took the lead in the third with three runs. Everhart singled to left and scored on a long double to right by Rajkovich. Long reached on a single and then came all the way around to score on a three-base error by the Trojans.

Anderson cut the lead to one run in the fifth when Cooper singled in Cash who had doubled. But the Eagles pushed the lead to 5-2 in the home half of the inning when Long and Jurjevic hit back-to-back doubles and Bo Ausmus tripled to left center to notch a RBI.

The Eagles seemed to be in control of the game until disaster struck in the sixth inning. An error put Nathan Galliford aboard to lead off the inning and he came home on Jonathan Zalud's single. Two consecutive doubles by Tony Price and Stephen McKnight plated two more runs and Hickman's sac fly to center produced the final run of the game.

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