June 4, 2010

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LOUISVILLE - Saint Louis suffered an 11-2 setback against Louisville Friday night on the first day of the NCAA Baseball Championship's Louisville Regional. The Billikens now face Illinois State Saturday in an elimination game at Jim Patterson Stadium. First pitch is slated for 11 a.m. (CT).

SLU dips to 33-28 with the loss, while Louisville, the region's top seed and seventh seed overall in the NCAA Tournament, moves to 49-12.

J.D. Dunn led the Billiken offense with a 3-for-4 performance at the plate. SLU's two runs came via back-to-back home runs by Danny Brock and Jon Myers, which gave SLU a 2-1 lead in the fourth inning.

Bryant Cotton was charged with the loss after six inning of work in which he allowed eight runs on 12 hits. He struck out four and walked two.

After a scoreless 2-1/2 innings, Louisville jumped on the scoreboard with a run in the bottom of the third, but the damage could have been worse as the Cardinals loaded the bases with just one out. Andrew Clark drove in the first run of the game when he lifted a sacrifice fly to right to plate Zak Wasserman and give Louisville the 1-0 advantage. Cotton then got out of the jam by getting Ryan Wright to pop out to right field.

SLU answered with back-to-back homers to start the top of the fourth to gain the lead. Brock lifted a solo shot to right field, and Myers followed suit with a long jack over the left-field wall to give the Billikens a 2-1 lead. It was Brock's 18th home run of the season, which is just one shy of Troy Hausladen's (1996) school record. Myers moved up to sixth on the single-season chart with his 16th homer of the year.

It was Louisville's turn to respond in the bottom of the third, and the Cardinals pushed across three runs to gain the lead for good at 4-2. The Cards quickly got two runners on, and Wasserman doubled in the first run of the inning. He tried to stretch the double into a triple but was gunned down at third by a Jerry Mancuso-to-Andrew Guerra relay.

That out proved beneficial to the Billikens as Louisville continued to rally in the fourth. Drew Haynes doubled, and came around to score on a Jeff Arnold base knock to left to make it 4-2. Louisville again lost a runner on the bases when Arnold was tagged out trying to advance on the throw.

The Billikens threatened in the top-half of the fifth but were unable to score. Mancuso drew a lead-off walk, which chased Louisville starter Derek Self from the game in favor of reliever Tony Zych. Zych got two quick outs before J.D. Dunn singled to right field, his third hit in as many at-bats. Zych got out of the jam, however, with a strikeout to keep it a 4-2 ballgame.

In the bottom of the inning, Louisville padded its lead after scoring two more. Adam Duvall and Wright reached, and eventually scored on a Stewart Ijames sacrifice fly and a Josh Richmond RBI double to give Louisville a 6-2 lead after five.

Louisville went up 9-2 in the bottom of the seventh, thanks in part to the long ball. Clark led off with a single, and Wright drove a Cotton pitch over the left-field fence to put the Cardinals on top 8-2. Reliever Jim Foster then came into the game and yielded a run on a balk to give Louisville the 9-2 advantage.

Clark gave UofL the eventual 11-2 with a two-run homer in the eighth. The Cardinals' Tony Zych earned the win after 3-1/3 innings of shutout ball.