March 28, 2016 Alex Brown Tailgate Tattler
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    Well, spring break is over and we are in the stretch run of the academic year. And as the weather warms up, Georgia Southern baseball is hoping to follow suit.

    The Eagles rattled off 10 wins in an 11-game stretch a couple of weeks ago, but Troy came to town and cooled Southern off a bit, taking two of three the weekend after St. Patrick’s Day. Georgia Southern took last week off from mid-week games and hit the road to Arkansas State for a three-game set.

    In Thursday’s opener, the Eagles gave starting pitcher Evan Challenger a four-run lead to work with in the top of the second. He tossed 7-2/3 innings and struck out 10 batters, allowing just six hits and three runs en route to an 8-3 Georgia Southern win. Challenger improves to 4-2 on the season.

    Arkansas State evened the series on Friday with a 6-5 walk-off win. The Eagles trailed 5-1 going into the seventh inning, but used two home runs — a pinch-hit solo shot by Drew Kelley and a three-run bomb by Ryan Cleveland — to tie it up. The Red Wolves broke the tie and won it on a bases-loaded single in the bottom of the ninth.

    Saturday’s rubber game saw a total of 12 pitchers used between the two teams and an eventful start. Georgia Southern took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first inning, but A-State plated three in the bottom of the inning. The Eagles answered with a four-spot in the top of the second and two runs each in the fifth and sixth innings, stretching out a 9-3 lead. The Red Wolves rallied for four runs in the eighth but could get no closer as Southern took the game and the series with a 9-7 win.

    Georgia Southern (15-8, 6-3) sits in a second-place tie with Texas State and UL-Lafayette, one game ahead of fifth-place Little Rock (12-11, 5-4). The Eagles’ next two conference series will be at home against the two teams they are currently tied with. Everyone is chasing first-place South Alabama (18-6, 9-0) who is perfect in Sun Belt play so far.

    The Eagles travel to Georgia Tech Wednesday before welcoming Texas State to town for a big conference series this weekend. This is a huge couple of weeks for the Eagles. It sure would be a good time to get hot and stay hot.

    Georgia Southern softball took two out of three over UT-Arlington over the weekend to improve to 4-2 in conference action and 17-15 overall. The Eagles fell earlier in the week to No. 12 Georgia on the road.

    The Eagles are currently in a third-place tie with Georgia State in the conference standings. South Alabama (18-10, 6-2) sits in second and UL-Lafayette (25-2, 7-1) is leading the pack.

    Southern will host Jacksonville for a Wednesday doubleheader before traveling to UL-Monroe for three games this weekend to resume its Sun Belt schedule.

    Women’s golf brought home a fourth-place finish in the Bearcat Classic over the weekend and finished just six strokes behind second-place Akron. The Eagles had two golfers finish in the top 20 individually with Iben Hvass finishing in a tie for 12th and Yeji Shinn tying for 18th place.

    The first-year program will compete in its first Sun Belt Conference Championship tournament in Destin, Florida, the weekend of April 17-19.