Abilene Christian drops high-scoring game to No. 9 Texas Tech after long sixth inning
Midway through their Tuesday evening contest against No. 9 Texas Tech, the Abilene Christian Wildcats were rolling.
They led 6-2 after four innings as a record 4,087 fans were in attendance. With a three-run fifth inning and overwhelming support from the home fan base, it seemed like the Wildcats could pull away from the visitors from Lubbock.
The Red Raiders’ sixth inning, though, was a silencer.
Texas Tech (32-16) scored nine runs to take an 11-6 lead and shush the home crowd. The Red Raiders coasted the rest of the way, winning 16-12.
“Any time you give up nine runs, that’s a long inning,” ACU head coach Rick McCarty said.
Aside from the woeful sixth inning, ACU (23-21) outscored Texas Tech 12-7. The Wildcats scored in seven of nine innings and hit well the entire game.
Both teams were dry in the first two innings before ACU opened the scoring in the third on a Tanner Tweedt RBI double.
The Wildcats followed scored two runs on three hits in the fourth. Then, Bryson Hill belted a home run to right field, giving the Wildcats a four-run lead.
ACU finished the game with 17 hits. Mitchell Dickson had a team-high five hits, while Grayson Tatrow had four.
“We put bat to ball,” McCarty said. “Offensively, I’m really proud of them and the grit they showed.”
The problem? Five hits, three walks and a hit-by-pitch in the top of the sixth inning turned a four-run ACU lead to a five-run deficit.
The biggest blow that inning was Parker Kelly’s three-run home run to center field. It widened Texas Tech’s lead from two runs to five runs and broke the game open.
“That inning got away from them,” McCarty said.
Credit to the Wildcats, though: They never truly went away.
ACU responded with six runs in the last four frames, scoring every inning. The Wildcats got a run off two hits and a walk in the ninth before TTU recorded the third and final out.
“I think we just kept fighting as a team,” Dickson said. “We had good approaches all night and we believed in each other. We fought really hard.”
For the Red Raiders, Kelly led the way with four hits, while Dillon Carter had three. Andrew Devine was one of seven Red Raiders to take the mound and earned the win out of the bullpen.
ACU’s Connor Carlton was one of 10 Wildcats who pitched, and he earned the loss. Carlton gave up three earned runs on two hits and a walk in a third of an inning.
Tuesday’s defeat was ACU’s first in a while. The Wildcats beat Texas Tech 8-5 the week before in Lubbock before sweeping Stephen F. Austin on the road last weekend.
And while Abilene Christian couldn’t earn the season sweep against the Red Raiders, the Wildcats competed well against a top-10 team in front of their biggest crowd ever.
That’s a win in McCarty’s book.
“It’s extremely special because that’s what we want here,” McCarty said. “We want to build a baseball community here. We wish we could’ve found a way to win it, but there were a lot of positives, too.”
Abilene Christian heads east across the Big Country this weekend for a three-game road set against Tarleton State in Stephenville. The series begins at 6 p.m. Friday.
The Wildcats have just one home series remaining — against Lamar on May 12-14.
Carson Field is the area sports reporter for the Abilene Reporter-News. He covers primarily Big Country high school sports. If you appreciate locally driven news, you can support local journalists with a digital subscription to reporternews.com.
This article originally appeared on Abilene Reporter-News: Abilene Christian falls to No. 9 Texas Tech after long sixth inning
