SPARTANBURG, S.C. — Chris King’s two-run homer in the top of the eighth inning broke an 8-8 tie and propelled the Elon Phoenix baseball team to a 10-9 victory over the Wofford Terriers in the first game of a three-game Southern Conference series on Friday evening at Russell C. King Field.
The Phoenix improved its overall record to 22-12 and now sits 8-5 in SoCon play. Wofford is 19-16, 2-8.
With the game even at eight following seven innings, Sebastian Gomez reached on a fielder’s choice to bring King to the plate. King then belted the second pitch he saw from Wofford’s Will Stillman deep over the wall in left for the game-winning homer. The shot was his team-leading fifth of the season.
Wofford pulled back within a run thanks to a one-out homer off the bat of Seth Neely in the last of the ninth.
The win went to Matt Harris (2-0) who tossed 3.2 scoreless innings of relief. Ryan Pennell threw the ninth to pick up his SoCon-best 10th save of the year.
Will Stillman (2-1) took the loss after he surrendered two runs on two hits in three innings out of the pen.
Most of the runs in the game came across in the fifth. The Phoenix scored five times on five hits before Wofford plated seven runs on four hits in the bottom half.
For Elon, Casey Jones kept his hit streak alive thanks to a 2-for-3 performance. His streak is now at 20 games. Eight of Elon’s nine starters recorded at least one hit and five of the nine had two-hit outings. Gomez drove in three runs with a 1-for-5 performance.
The two squads will play game two of the series at 3 p.m. on Saturday afternoon.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E
Elon 0 0 2 0 5 1 0 2 0 10 13 3
Wofford 0 1 0 0 7 0 0 0 1 9 11 0
Win – Harris (2-0).
Loss – Stillman (2-1).
Save – Pennell (10).
Umpires – HP: Randy Collins 1B: Joe Holt 3B: Kevin Bradley
Start: 6:00 pm Time: 3:12 Attendance: 119
Weather: Sunny, 75 deg., Winds: SW 14