It’s been that kind of year for Southern baseball.
The Jaguars were two outs away from a sweep of cellar-dwelling Alcorn State on Sunday, but the bullpen couldn’t hold the lead in a 9-8 loss to the Braves.
The defeat took the shine off the weekend in which the Jaguars won the first two games, 3-0 and 5-2, and it kept the Jaguars (19-26, 14-10 SWAC) from moving into a second-place tie for the Southwestern Athletic Conference West Division lead with Texas Southern.
Grambling (26-24, 20-6) clinched the title and will hold the No. 1 seed from the West in the SWAC Tournament which begins next Wednesday.
Southern has plenty to play for in the final weekend of the season against Arkansas-Pine Bluff and can finish anywhere from second to fourth. Texas Southern (15-9) is a game ahead of the Jaguars and Prairie View a game behind in fourth. The Southern-UAPB series at Lee-Hines will begin at 6 p.m. Thursday. The Panthers (18-29, 10-17) took two of three from Southern three weeks ago at Pine Bluff.
The Alcorn loss was doubly frustrating coming against a team with only four conference wins in 27 games, two against Southern. The Jaguars got good pitching most of the weekend, but was outhit 21-18 in the three games and had only two extra base hits. Hunter Tabb had a two-run triple and JJ Rollon a three-run double in the Sunday loss.
Southern pitching had four walks and four hit batters. Alcorn State walked six and hit two in addition to committing four errors.
“It was kind of a who-wanted-to-give-it-away game,” Southern coach Chris Crenshaw said. “And we found a way to give it away in the end. The wind was blowing in, it blows in and across at their place. O’Neill (Burgos) hit a couple balls hard, Tabb hit a couple, right into people.
“Our pitching got better. Antoine had a good start which was needed. Nick Wilson had a good start. Jalon (Long) was OK. It was the first time we were able to use Enrique Ozoa back-to-back.
Nick Wilson and Ozoa combined for a four-hit shutout in the opener. Wilson walked none and struck out 11, giving him 51 strikeouts in his past five games. Ozoa got the save in each of the first two games, but he gave up a walk-off, two-run double to Tyler Daniels in relief of Jerry Burkett.
Burgos continued his hot hitting with four hits and a pair of RBIs in the first two games combined. His RBI-single capped a three-run rally in the ninth inning in the 5-2 victory. Ozoa pitched a scoreless ninth for his fourth save.
Southern fell behind 6-2 in the series finale, which was shortened to seven innings because of time constraints. But the Jaguars scored six runs in the sixth to take the lead on key hits by Tabb and Rollon.
“We have to take care of business this weekend,” Crenshaw said. “It’s a big one. We’ve got to go out and play good baseball. Throw strikes, play defense and get timely hits. Right now, we’re not getting them.”
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