Sean Trawick

Staff Writer

The Troy Trojans wrapped up another disappointing weekend series on Sunday, losing to the Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders 11-7 only one day after securing a dramatic late-inning win.
The loss was Troy’s fifth in six games, and dropped its season record to 10-8.
The win for the Blue Raiders improved their record to 7-9.
“The records don’t always mean anything,” Troy assistant coach Mark Smartt said, referring to Middle Tennessee’s season record. “We knew they were going to be a good club, and they came in and did some things and played well the whole weekend.”
After earning a win in Saturday night’s slug-fest, a game that came down to a last-bat, game-winning hit for the Trojans, the coaches had hoped they had turned a corner.
“We said on Saturday, that’s a great, uplifting win that might spill over into some wins for us,” Smartt said.
And it looked as if that might have been the case on Sunday when the Trojans got off to a great start with four runs in the first inning.
Unfortunately for the Trojans, that momentum wouldn’t sustain them through the rest of the game.
The Blue Raiders were able to answer with three runs of their own in the third inning, cutting the lead to 4-3.
In the seventh inning, with a 5-3 lead for Troy, things went south quickly.
Middle Tennessee was able to get a rally started that saw eight Blue Raiders cross the plate on four doubles, a single and a hit batsman, to take an 11-5 lead.
The Trojans would not give up and battled all the way into the ninth inning.
Josh Dew was able to launch a two-run home run, cutting the lead to 11-7, and Troy was able to get the tying run to the plate, but Middle Tennessee was able to shut down the rally and take the weekend series.
“Our team hasn’t quite learned how to finish an opponent off yet,” Smartt said. “We took a 4-0 lead, and then in the seventh inning it’s 5-3. We never got anything going offensively to stretch the lead out.”
“We’ve just got to learn from it and take whatever you can from it and try to get better,” Smartt added.