Charleston Southern officially is off to their best start in school history as they moved to 6-0 on the year. The Bucs held on to defeat Elon by a 5-4 final score on Sunday afternoon in the continuation of Saturday's rain delayed game two of the series. The only other team in school history to be 5-0, which was the 1977 squad, dropped their sixth game of the year for their first loss.
Charleston Southern jumped out to an early lead in the second inning. The Bucs first three batters, Alex Marot, Lucas Pringle and Nathan Martinez, each drew a walk to load the bases. Gavin Spiers stepped to the plate and drove a double to left center to clear them and score all three runners for the 3-0 lead.
In the top of the fifth, the game entered a rain delay and was postponed until Sunday afternoon. Prior to the delay, Elon had one out on the board with runners on second and third. When the game restarted, the Phoenix got a sacrifice flyout to right center to bring a runner home and get their first run of the contest.
In the bottom half of the inning, Chander Tuupo got aboard with a single and Pringle drew a walk for runners on first and second. Martinez had a single go through the right side to score Tuupo and move Pringle to third. Spiers grounded out to third and it allowed for Pringle to score on the play to push the score to 5-1.
In the sixth, Elon got another run back to bring the score to 5-2. In the eighth, an RBI single and a sacrifice flyout cut another two off their deficit and brought it to a 5-4 scoreline. Drew Dawson entered in the eighth and recorded three outs on three batters faced. Hayden Henry then came in for the ninth and got them out in order to hold on for the win.
Marot and Martinez both had two hits on the day to lead the team as they had eight as a squad. Spiers collected four RBIs with Martinez having the other. They drew five walks as well and had two hit by pitches.
Charleston Southern started the day with Brady Bickett on the mound and he threw the first 4.0 innings without allowing a run to score. He surrendered just one hit and struck out three batters. Jack Bunnell picked up the win throwing the fifth and sixth innings and allowed one earned run. He was on the mound heading into the delay and still was following it.
For the final three innings, Zach Stichweh, Drew Dawson and Hayden Henry each had an inning of work with Henry having the ninth to pick up the save. Dawson and Henry both retired all three of the batters that they faced.
The two teams return to the diamond later this afternoon for game three of the series with the Bucs looking to continue their historic start.