WINTER HAVEN, Fla. - The Milwaukee baseball team could not hold a 3-0 lead in the sixth and then had a ninth-inning rally come up just short in falling, 7-6, to Kent State Sunday at the Russmatt Baseball 2016 Central Florida Invitational.
"Unfortunately our defense broke our backs," Milwaukee head coach
Scott Doffek said. "But I loved the fight our guys showed in the eighth and ninth inning today, we just came up one run short."
The Panthers (2-6) got a strong start from
Adam Reuss, who gave up five hits in 5.0 innings, dominating on the mound with a career-high eight strikeouts and just one walk.
"Reuss was outstanding and threw the ball the way he is capable of throwing it," Doffek said. "We really ended up wasting what was just a great start by him."
The Golden Flashes (4-3) saved their best effort for late, scoring four times in the sixth to take the lead. They tacked on three more runs in the eighth and then escaped when a Milwaukee rally in the ninth plated a pair and had the tying run on second base before coming up just short.
Luke Meeteer led the UWM offense on the day, going 3-for-5 with an RBI and a run scored.
Dylan Detert was a perfect 2-for-2 with a run and an RBI and
Jeremy Wright had a base hit and drove in two.
Connor Simonetti paced a 13-hit Flash attack with a 3-for-4 afternoon. The win gave them a perfect 4-0 weekend in Florida.
Reuss struck out the side in the first and stayed hot from there. He struck out five of the first six batters he faced and allowed just a lone single through the first three innings.
Milwaukee got on the scoreboard in the second on a Detert single and tacked on two more in the third on Wright's one-out double.
Trouble came in the sixth. Kent State started the inning with four hits in a row to tie the game at 3-3 and then took the lead on a sacrifice fly.
The Panthers had the game tied again in the eighth, plating a run on an error to make it a new game at 4-4. But, a pair of errors in the bottom half of the inning allowed three runs to score, which was just enough to hold on following the UWM rally in the ninth.
Milwaukee heads to Arizona next, spending Tuesday practicing in preparation for opening Spring Training against the Milwaukee Brewers Wednesday. Game time is set for a 1:05 p.m. CST first pitch.
