HUNTSVILLE – The Sam Houston Bearkats stayed red hot on Tuesday night, erasing a 5-1 deficit to score an 8-6 win over Texas A&M at Don Sanders Stadium.
The Bearkats (13-13) evened their season record with the win, their first over the Aggies since 2017. Sam Houston has now won seven in a row and nine of its last 10 entering its upcoming weekend series at New Orleans, set to begin Friday night on the Lakefront at Maestri Field.
Tanner Sembera was stellar in 3.0 innings of 1-hit, scoreless relief that saw him punch out five Aggies without a walk to earn his first win of the season. He, along with fellow relievers
Cole Wesneski and
Alex Havlicek managed to shut out the Aggies for 5.0 innings before handing a 3-run lead over to
Lance Lusk in the ninth.
Lusk allowed a run on three hits, but made the advantage stand up for his sixth save of the season, retiring Will Frizzell with a pair of runners on base to close out the game.
At the plate,
Jack Rogers and
Colton Cowser continued their strong offensive surge, each homering in the win. Rogers had a pair of hits, including a 3-run homer in the third inning that trimmed the Aggie lead to 5-4.
Meanwhile, Cowser got the Kats on the board in the first inning with an opposite-field solo homer and went on to reach base four times, including a pair of intentional walks later in the game.
Mason Schulz and
Brandon Pruitt each added a pair of hits, while
Gavin Johnson had a pair of RBI.
A Bearkat throwing error and a solo homer by Austin Bost gave the Aggies an early lead against Sam Houston starter
Matt Rudis, and after Cowser's homer in the bottom half, Texas A&M got three more home in the top of the second for a 5-1 lead.
But from there the Bearkats went to work, starting with Rogers' blast over the right-center field fence an inning later. Then, in the fourth, Schulz evened things up when he brought home
Bryce Holmes with an RBI triple just inside fair territory deep in the left-field corner.
An inning later Johnson gave the Kats the lead and put Texas A&M's Jonathan Chandler on the hook for the loss with an RBI single for a 6-5 edge. An aggie error and a bases-loaded walk to Johnson upped the lead to 8-5 in the sixth, and Havlicek and Wesneski made that stand up with scoreless work in relief.
But things got a little testy in the ninth as the Aggies got a run back on an RBI ground out by Ty Coleman and then 2-out singles by Bryce Blaum and Ray Alejo got the go-ahead run to the plate in Frizzell; however, Lusk was able to get the Aggie first basema to fly out harmlessly to right field to end it.
