April 18, 2008

Oviedo, FL (UWIRE) -- There is nothing more important than Conference USA success for the UCF Baseball team.

The Knights won their first conference series of the season this past weekend against Memphis, and were surely looking forward to continuing that success this weekend at Marshall.

But the Knights' journey hit a non-conference bump in the road Tuesday with a 5-3 loss to North Florida.

UCF starting pitcher Mitch Herold, coming off his complete game effort against Stetson on April 9, was the star for the Knights (26-13 overall, 4-8 in C-USA). He put a lot of runners on base by giving up nine hits and three walks, but was able to get out of jams most of the time.

Herold allowed three runs in seven innings of work and struck out seven batters.

The Ospreys (21-17 overall, 11-10 in the Atlantic Sun Conference) could have made the score look a lot worse if they had brought home just a few of the 12 runners they left on base.

Herold kept the Knights in the game, but he didn't factor into the decision as the Ospreys broke a 3-3 tie with two runs in the eighth off reliever Austin Hudson.

Sam Perry started the inning with a walk and then moved to second on a passed ball by Brandon Romans.

The next three Ospreys batters - Michael Gropper, Michael P. Smith and Chad Knight - all hit singles. None of the hits made it out of the infield, but they were effective enough to score Perry and load the bases with still nobody out.

After Gropper was thrown out at home by second baseman Dwayne Bailey on a fielder's choice ground ball, Travis Martin walked to force home the Osprey's second run of the inning.

The Knights threatened to score in the ninth inning, as pinch hitter Tim Russell opened the inning with a walk and then pitch runner Josh Siebenaler stole second base.

Colin Arnold got Siebenaler to third base with two outs on a ground out, but after a walk to Robert Lara, Tyler Stohr got Eric Kallstrom to hit an infield pop-up to finish the game.

It was the ninth save of the season for the Osprey's closer.

The Knights scored first as Tyson Auer came home on a passed ball in the third inning, but the Ospreys would come back with three runs in the bottom of the fourth.

With one out, North Florida strung together five consecutive singles. Again, the majority of the hits weren't very solid, but they were hit to the right spot and allowed three runs to score.

The final hit in that stretch came when Smith tapped a slow roller to Herold between first base and the pitcher's mound. He fielded and threw it past Lara, the first baseman.

The ball went into right field and Perry came around from second to score on single and the error.

But UCF coach Jay Bergman begged to differ with the umpires. He said Smith ran inside the baseline, and that forced Herold to make a bad throw.

Bergman argued and argued some more. In the end, he was ejected from a game for the first time since April 30, 2006, against Rice.

UCF tied the score in its next at bat with help from an error from Knight and a passed ball.

The Knights compiled eight hits, including two each from Romans, Auer and Evan Stobbs. Stobbs now has at least two hits in four of the six previous games in which he has played.

Knight had three hits for the Ospreys, while Gropper and Smith each had two hits and an RBI. UNF starting pitcher Jonathan Turner pitched well through five innings, but he wasn't part of the decision.

Instead, Tucker Pryor pitched the seventh and eighth innings to move his record up to 4-3. Hudson dropped to 2-1.

With the mid-week game out of the way, UCF can go back to solely focusing on conference action this weekend at Marshall.

The Thundering Herd (16-19 overall, 4-7 in C-USA) have won their past two games after going through a six-game winless drought.

One key for the Knights will be to exploit Marshall's most glaring weakness: pitching.

As a team, Marshall ranks ninth out of the conference's 10 teams with a 5.48 ERA.

The Knights and Thundering Herd will start their series tonight at 7 p.m.

Saturday's game is scheduled to start at 1 p.m., and both teams will be up early Sunday for the 10 a.m. start time.

(C) 2008 Central Florida Future via UWIRE