April 15, 2000

Box Score

TAMPA - Saint Louis University baseball suffered its second critical defeat at the hands of South Florida this afternoon, losing the Bulls 13-6 at Red McEwen Field. USF used 18 hits and a nine-run fourth to erase five fielding errors and ward off the Billikens as the teams jockey for position in Conference USA.

Saint Louis struck first in the second inning when shortstop Paul Miles (St. Louis, Mo./Jefferson College) put a two-out double down the leftfield line to drive in Brian Haddock (St. Louis, Mo./SLUH) who had reached on an error. USF answered the call with a pair of runs in the bottom of the inning to take the lead. It was Haddock who stepped up in the third inning for Saint Louis with a two-out bases loaded single to drive in two runs and put the Bills back on top 3-2.

After tying the game in the bottom of the third, South Florida led off the fourth with a pair of singles and a sacrifice bunt to put runners at second and third. Saint Louis starter Ryan Warnecke (Highland, Ill./BAC) hit the next batter and gave up another single, pushing two runs across the plate. Another run scored on a fielder's choice before Ben Hutton (Edwardsville, Ill./Edwardsville) came on in relief. His results varied little from Warnecke's as the Bulls went on to score six more times in the inning and take a commanding 12-3 lead.

Saint Louis put three runs on the board on the board in the top of the ninth, but the deficit was too much to overcome as the Billikens fell to 14-21 on the season, 3-11 in Conference USA.

The teams meet for the third, and final time, on Sun., April 16 at noon (CT).