West Burlington, IA - The Illinois Central College Baseball team (11-30) took a short break from conference play on Tuesday afternoon when the Cougars went west to take on the Southeastern Iowa Blackhawks in a stand-alone game. ICC would have a quality day at the plate, tallying seven runs and 12 hits, but Southeastern Iowa was busy on the scoreboard as well, to the tune of 19 runs and 16 hits in the 12-run victory. 

SOUTHEASTERN IOWA 19, ILLINOIS CENTRAL 7
The Cougars found themselves behind the eight-ball early, trailing 3-0 after an inning, but they would cut it back to a one-run game thanks to RBI groundouts from Kaiden Lucero and Ryan Brucker. However, the Blackhawks were ready, and countered with another three-run inning to retake the lead. Colton Williams would get an RBI on a sacrifice fly in the third, but the margin was still three. 

It would be yet another big inning from Southeastern Iowa, this time powering four more runs across the plate for a 10-3 lead after three innings. This, though, is where ICC made their push.

The Cougars would out-score the Blackhawks 4-0 over the next two innings, thanks to Brucker scoring on a wild pitch, a Thomas Krueger RBI sacrifice fly, an RBI single from Brucker, and Lucero scoring on a throw amid Brucker's single. Suddenly, it was back to a three-run game again. 

This time, Southeastern Iowa really surged ahead, using an RBI sacrifice fly, two-run double, grand slam, RBI single, and RBI sacrifice fly to set the final score at 19-7 in the sixth before holding ICC 1-2-3 in the seventh to officially close the books on the game.

COUGAR HITTING
Kaiden Lucero | 2 singles, 1 RBI, 1 stolen base
Thomas Krueger | 1 RBI, 1 walk
Ryan Brucker | 3 singles, 3 RBI
Jayden Malone | 1 single, 1 hit by pitch, 1 stolen base
Chris Casey | 2 singles
Jake Stewart | 1 walk
Colton Williams | 1 single, 1 RBI
Elliot Seckman | 2 singles, 1 walk, 1 stolen base
Nate Bartman | 1 single, 1 walk

COUGAR PITCHING
Caleb Bieneman | 1 inning, 2 hits, 1 earned run, 1 walk, 1 strikeout
Finn Heath | 1 inning, 2 hits, 2 earned runs, 0 walks, 0 strikeouts
Eli Wang | 1 inning, 4 hits, 4 earned runs, 2 walks, 0 strikeouts
Brett Granger | 1 inning, 1 hit, 0 earned runs, 0 walks, 1 strikeout
Billy Mini | 1.1 innings, 4 hits, 6 earned runs, 0 walks, 1 strikeout
Caleb Diver | 0.2 innings, 3 hits, 3 earned runs, 0 walks, 0 strikeouts

WHAT'S NEXT FOR THE COUGARS
@ John Wood Blazers
Friday, April 18th - 12:00 PM (DH)
at JWCC Baseball Field - Quincy, IL