JOPLIN, Mo. – Missouri Southern jumped on Missouri S&T in the early stages of the contest Wednesday night and came away with an 11-2 non-conference victory at Joe Becker Stadium.

 

The Lions, who are contending for a playoff spot in the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association, scored twice in the first inning to take the lead and broke the game open with a four-run third and two-run fourth.

 

Southern got the early advantage on a two-run homer by Jacob Taylor in that opening inning, then the Miners got on the scoreboard in the second with an uprising with two outs.

 

Consecutive hits by Zac Helton (Ballwin, Mo./Marquette) and Tim Kerouac (Bourbonnais, Ill./Bishop McNamara) preceded an error by Taylor on a ball hit by Hunter Scheib (Lawrence, Kan./Free State), allowing Helton to score an unearned run to cut the lead in half.

 

However, Skyler Rawlins led off the bottom of the third with a home run for the Lions, then with one out, Southern strung together four straight hits, a walk and a sacrifice fly to round out its four-run inning to put it up 6-1.

 

Juan Hernandez had a two-run single in the fourth to make it 8-1, then the Lions added three more runs in the seventh before the Miners got a run across in the ninth on a two-out infield single by Louie Joseph (Bloomington, Ill./Central Catholic) with the bases loaded.

 

S&T was held to six hits in the contest while the Lions had 16. Miner starter Caleb Lambert (Romulus, Mich./Inter-City Baptist), one of six S&T hurlers employed on the night, took the loss.

 

The Miners (13-25) will open a critical four-game Great Lakes Valley Conference series at home Saturday when they host Southern Indiana in a doubleheader. The twinbill between the GLVC West's second- and third-place teams starts at 1 p.m. at the Missouri S&T Baseball Field.