College Baseball

USC Upstate 10, Rider University 3

SPARTANSBURG, SC—The Broncs scored three runs on five hits and committed four errors in a loss to USC Upstate Sunday afternoon.

“I think we pitched much better,” said Rider head coach Barry Davis. “We only walked three batters, so that's an improvement.”

The Broncs gave up five unearned runs Sunday.

For Rider (0-3), sophomore Christian Estevez (River Edge, NJ/River Dell) hit a pair of doubles. “That's what I wanted to see when we put him out there,” Davis said. “We have a lot of players to see and see how they react to playing. We've seen some good thing and not so good. It is going to be disappointing to some of these players.”

Two walks, a wild pitch and RBI singles by senior Patrick Murphy (McHenry, Ill./McHenry) and junior Lee Lipinski (Glen Arm, MD/Calvert) cut the Upstate lead to 3-2 in the top of the fourth inning. “Murph had some better at bats and Bender had a big hit.”

Rider sophomore Jake Bender (Ellicot, Md./Marriotts Ridge) doubled and scored on an error to cut the Upstate lead to 5-3 in the fifth inning.

Upstate (5-2) took a 3-0 lead in the third inning with a three-run home run. The Spartans scored two in the fourth and two in the fifth to take a 7-3 lead.

The Spartans added three unearned runs in the sixth inning for a 10-3 lead.

“Another positive is that we played most of the players,” Davis said. “That is what we need right now, to play games and see these players in game action. We saw some good things.”

The Broncs return north to play Lafayette Tuesday in a neutral site game in Flemington, NJ at Diamond Nation. “We're excited to play this game,” Davis said.  “We need to get back out on the field as soon as possible.”

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