Indians fall apart late in conference loss to Nasvhille
Things went from bad to worse quickly for the Indians Monday evening, surrendering nine runs in the seventh-inning as they fell to their conference foe Nashville, 11-0. <br />Jordan Edwards was effective through 6 1/3 innings of work, surrendering just two earned runs on seven hits and two walks while striking out seven. <br />Leading 2-0 already, Nashville blew the game wide open in the top of the seventh. <br />Edwards was pulled after two runs came around to score as on a single that scooted past the center fielder. <br />From there, the Hornets piled on. <br />The Indians committed another error and Nashville capitalized with a couple of bases-loaded walks and followed up with a pair of back-to-back home runs to extend its lead to 11-0. <br />"Jordan threw a great game," Du Quoin head coach Tim Craft said. "We just kind of sunk ourselves in that last inning and the home runs just made it worse. We know we have to make every play. <br />"We want our pitchers to throw strikes and make them put the ball in play and we expect to make the plays. We did it up until the sixth and seventh inning and it (the nine-run seventh inning) happened fast."<br />Offensively, the Indians chances were few and far between as they collected just two hits, both from Tevin Lee. <br />Lee put Du Quoin in prime scoring position in the bottom of the first, reaching on a one-out single and advancing to third on a pair of stolen bases. Edwards nearly scored him on a soft ground ball to the short stop, but was thrown out on a bang-bang play at first. <br />The Indians didn't threaten again until the bottom of the sixth. Stewart led off the inning with a walk and T. Lee followed up with his second single of the game. <br />Braden Lee advanced the runners to second and third with a groundout, but the Indians could not capitalize from there. <br />Similar to the first inning, the inning ended another close play at first base as Ashton Smith nearly beat out an infield single with two outs. <br />"You can't score runs if you are not hitting," Craft said. "We had opportunities to probably score two or three runs. With the middle of our lineup and guys in scoring position, we just couldn't get that hit when we needed to."<br />Du Quoin (13-9) will look to bounce back with another tough matchup on Wednesday when they host the Benton Rangers at 4:30 p.m.