MURFREESBORO, TN—C-USA leader Middle Tennessee (15-10/7-1) defeated Old Dominion, 8-2 Saturday afternoon in a nationally televised American Sports Network/C-USA contest at the Reese Smith, Jr. Field. ODU (13-10/3-5) was led by sophomore outfielder Joseph Guaragna (Ontario, Canada) who went four-for-four on the day.
The Monarchs took a 1-0 lead as junior infielder Derek Francis (Manhattan, KS.) singled home PJ Higgins (Wallingford, CT.) in the first inning.
Middle Tennessee rallied to score three runs in the bottom half of the first led by Jake Ingold who singled home two of the three runs. He would later knocked in a run in the sixth inning while Michael Adkins also drove in three runs for the Blue Raiders.
ODU added a run in the eighth inning on a Nick Lustrino (Spring Lake, NJ.) RBI groundout which plated Connor Myers (Middletown, MD.).
The Monarchs stranded 10 runners for the second straight game, which included seven in the first three innings.
Ronnie Jebavy led Middle with three hits, while Dustin Delgado, Jake Ingold and Kevin Duppree each had two hits.
The two teams will play the third and final game of the series Sunday at 2 p.m. (ET). Listen to the game live on STAR1310 AM with Doug Ripley providing the radio play by play.
ODU 100 000 010=2-6-0
MT 300 003 20x=8-11-0
Hartman, Bainbridge(6),Rienerth (7) and Perez
MT- Hoffman, Cash(7), Stansberry(7) and Schnur
WP: Hoffman(2-1) LP: Hartman(0-2)