University of Tennessee Athletics
University of Tennessee
Middle Tennessee State
Vols Fall Short at Middle Tennessee, 7-5
April 14, 2015 | Baseball
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. -- The Tennessee Volunteers battled Middle Tennessee through a back-and-forth contest on Tuesday night but came up short, as the Blue Raiders took a 7-5 victory at Reese Smith Jr. Field.
With the loss, Tennessee moves to 15-17 on the season and is now 10-7 against non-conference opponents in 2015. Middle Tennessee improves to 20-16 with the win.
"We gave too many free passes," Head Coach Dave Serrano said. "It wasn't like either team swung the bat extremely well. We just didn't play good baseball. I don't want to take anything away from MTSU. They did what they had to do to win. Their relief pitching came in and shut the door on us and that's something that we didn't do."
Tennessee took the early advantage in the first inning, as first baseman Andrew Lee blasted a two-run homer over the left field wall. The home run marked Lee's fourth of the season and the fifth of his career as a Volunteer.
The Blue Raiders came back in the third and pushed three runs across, taking a 3-2 lead. Tennessee then took advantage of two walks and two errors by MTSU to score two runs and go ahead, 4-3, in the fourth. The Blue Raiders chipped away and tied it up at 4-4 in the sixth before using a standup triple by Middle Tennessee's Austin Bryant to start a one-out rally and make it a 7-4 ballgame.
The Vols threatened again in the eighth, loading the bases with no outs before right fielder Johnny Youngblood knocked a sacrifice fly to center, making the score 7-5. The rally ultimately fell short after the Blue Raiders turned a double play to end the inning.
Starting lefthander Zach Warren made his fourth career start on Tuesday night and allowed three runs on four hits over 3.0 innings of work to receive no decision.
Righthander and Murfreesboro native Hunter Martin entered the game in relief of Warren in the fourth, making his first collegiate appearance in his hometown, and went 2.2 innings, allowing one run on two hits with three strikeouts.
Righthanders Peter Lenstrohm and Kyle Serrano each made appearances against the Blue Raiders, before Steven Kane came in to hold MTSU and give Tennessee a chance in the ninth. Collectively, Tennessee's staff issued nine walks in the contest against Middle Tennessee, a new season high for UT.
The Volunteers continue their current road stretch with a three-game series visiting the Kentucky Wildcats on Thursday, April 16 - Saturday, April 18. Thursday's game is slated for 7 p.m. ET, Friday's matchup is slated for 6:30 p.m. ET and Saturday's series finale will begin at 12 p.m. ET. Both Thursday and Saturday games will be broadcast on SEC Network, while Friday's game will be available for viewing via SEC Network + stream.
"We have to let this go," Serrano said. "We have a big weekend series at Kentucky that we'll leave for tomorrow. This one hurts but the pain can't last too long because this big series is looking us right in the face."
For the most up-to-date information about the Tennessee baseball program, visit UTSports.com/baseball and follow @Vol_Baseball on Twitter.
