Bulldog arm shine in 11-5 win

PERKINSTON — Mississippi Gulf Coast’s pitching staff all but eliminated free bases Saturday, and the bats rallied for eight runs in the last two at-bats to be Illinois Central 11-5 at Ken “Curly” Farris Field.

“We only had two walks from the mound, and it was a great bullpen effort,” Bulldogs coach Bob Keller said. “What I’m most proud of is we didn’t give a lot of freebies off the mound.  The bullpen gave us a really good effort.”

Aiden Seymour (Fr., D’Iberville/D’Iberville) gave the Bulldogs five strong innings in a start, and Adrian Byrd (So., Wiggins/Stone) struck out six in 2.1 innings to close the game out and pick up the win. Nick Hamby (Fr., D’Iberville/D’Iberville) and Will Whittington (So., Hattiesburg/Presbyterian Christian) combined for 1.2 innings of no-hit, no-run middle relief.

Gulf Coast (13-5) struck out 13 Cougars.

Brandon Cain (So., Mobile, Ala./Baker) doubled in the tying run in the seventh. Charlie Keller (So., Mobile, Ala./Mobile Christian) had a sacrifice fly for the lead, and Kaden Irving (Fr., Gautier/Gautier) beat out a swinging bunt to make it 6-4.

Ty Mancha (So., Albuquerque, N.M./Mobile Christian) had a two-run single before the inning was done.

Marc Stephens (So., Orange Beach, Ala./Gulf Shores) crushed a three-run homer in the eighth for the final margin. He went 3-for-4 and extended his hit streak to 10 games.

“We’ve been a little spoiled and come to expect it,” Keller said. “The last couple days he wasn’t quite himself, and we gave him a little bit of a hard time, but he still had a couple hits, even in those games.”

Irving also doubled, as did Keilon Parnell (Fr., Pascagoula/Pascagoula) off the bench. The Bulldogs bench scored three times and went 2-for-4 with a walk and a hit batsman.

Gulf Coast’s MACCC tripleheader at Wesson this week has been moved to Wednesday because of the weather forecast. The Bulldogs will play host Copiah-Lincoln at 11 a.m. followed by Northwest Mississippi.

For more information on MGCCC’s 11 intercollegiate athletic teams, follow @MGCCCBulldogs on Twitter and MGCCCBulldogs on Facebook, and go to mgcccbulldogs.com.