FARMVILLE, Va. – Looking to defend its claim to second place in the Big South standings, USC Upstate baseball didn't let a game time change stand in its way of claiming a series-opening victory over Longwood behind a 9-3 win Friday afternoon.
Pitching carried the Spartans Friday as freshman right-hander
Noah Sullivan retired the first eight batters he faced and carried a no-hitter into the sixth in the second pitching start of his career. He worked 5.1 innings, allowing just one hit and two runs while striking out a career-best four in a career-long outing.
Earning his second save of the season, redshirt junior righty
Chase Matheny tossed the final 3.2 innings of the game, surrendering just three hits and a run. He tied a career-high with five strikeouts, striking out three straight batters spanning the seventh and eighth innings before punching out the final two batters of the game to secure the victory.
At the plate, redshirt junior first baseman
Adam Grob drove home a career-high four runs, hitting a three-run homer in the second inning before plating another with a groundout in the fifth. Senior rightfielder
Noah Myers and redshirt sophomore shortstop
Troy Hamilton put forth multi-hit games while senior second baseman
Cameron MacIntosh drew a career-high three walks.
Game Information
Score: USC Upstate 9; Longwood 3
Records: USC Upstate (28-18; 14-5 Big South); Longwood (19-25; 9-7 Big South)
Location: Buddy Bolding Stadium | Farmville, Va.
Scoring Summary
- T2: Following a two-out single and walk, Adam Grob lined a 3-2 pitch over the leftfield wall with his 3-run homer building an early Upstate lead. The Spartans added another pair of runs as a bunt single from Noah Myers brought home Jack Hennessy while a throwing error on the same play allowed Devin Buckner to score and grow the lead to 5-0.
- B3: After working a two-out walk to earn Longwood's first baserunner of the afternoon, Hayden Harris took advantage of two wild pitches to score the Lancers' first tally of the game.
- T5: Opening the inning with four straight singles, Upstate pushed across three runs with back-to-back RBI singles from Noah Rabon and Easton Cullison before Troy Hamilton plated another with a groundout. The final run of the frame came from an RBI groundout from Grob to fashion a 9-1 Upstate lead.
- B6: After collecting his team's first hit of the day with a leadoff double, Harris came into score after advancing to third on a groundout before an RBI single through the left side from Eliot Dix brought him Harris home.
- B7: Again taking advantage of a leadoff double, Longwood tallied its final run as Dylan Wilkinson shot a ball through the left side, allowing Hunter Gilliam to come into score.
Notable
- Hitting a three-run homer before adding a fourth run batted in with a groundout, Adam Grob tallied a career-high four RBI Friday afternoon, putting together his sixth multi-RBI game of the season.
- Behind Grob's homer—his second of the season—Upstate extended its streak of games with a homer to nine.
- In addition to his career day on the mound, Noah Sullivan also extended his team-long reached base streak to 30 games. The streak is the longest know reached base streak by a Spartan in the Division I era (2007-pres.) but records further back than 2019 are limited and the record is considered to be unofficial.
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