Averett baseball earns series sweep of Battling Bishops

Rocky Mount, NC - The Cougar baseball team of Averett University earned a series sweep over North Carolina Wesleyan this weekend, downing the Bishops by 4-3 and 9-4 scores on Saturday and Sunday, respectively.  Saturday's game went 11 innings before AU pulled out the victory.  Averett is now 24-5 on the season, 4-2 in USA South play.  The Battling Bishops have dropped five of their last six games and are 15-10 overall, 4-4 in league action.

On Saturday, NCWC’s Blake Rice and AU’s Ahmed Shelton both went the distance in an 11-inning marathon that eventually ended in a 4-3 Cougar win.

Eric Sibrizzi paced the AU offensive attack with a 4-for-6 showing at the plate, including the game-winning RBI-single with two outs in the 11th.  Joey Garry was 3-for-5 for the Cougars, who collected 15 hits as at team.

Junior Matt Smith paced Wesleyan by going 4-for-5 with an RBI and run-scored, while Nathan West went 3-for-5.  The Bishops ripped 14 hits on the day.

Rice suffered the loss after allowing all four runs (three earned).  He struck out a season-high 14 and walked just two.

On Sunday, the Bishops held a 4-2 lead going into the eighth inning.  Averett, however, plated six runs in the frame to go up 8-2 and Wesleyan would not recover.

NCWC senior Ben Pearson went seven complete and allowed just two runs (none earned) on five hits.  Reliever Ben Moore was touched for five of the eighth inning’s six runs and took the loss.

The Bishops were paced offensively by Luke Williford’s 4-for-5 performance.

Wesleyan returns to action on Monday when the Bishops host Endicott College at 3:00 p.m.

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