Oral Roberts Golden Eagles Win Summit League Opener

Originally Published: Apr 9, 2010 10:18 PM CDT

Andrew Topps
Oklahoma Sports Staff Writer

TULSA, Oklahoma -- Oral Roberts cruised past Oakland 10-0 in the series opener Friday. ORU scored its 10 runs off of 15 hits.

The Golden Eagles (13-13, 1-0) started things off quickly in the first inning. Nick Baligod singled into center to drive in Joey Winiecki and give ORU an early 1-0 lead. A couple batters later, Robert Barbosa’s triple to left center brought in two more runs for the Golden Eagles and made it a 3-0 game. P.J. Sequeira singled on the next play to bring Barbosa home.

Seth Furmanek led off the fifth inning with a solo home run to put ORU on top 5-0. Colby Price’s two out single drove in Sequeira to make a 6-0 Golden Eagles lead.

Oral Roberts did all of its damage in the seventh inning with two outs. Baligod drew a bases loaded walk which brought Sequeira in to score. Tyler Saladino’s single down the third base line allowed two more runs to cross the plate and pushed ORU’s lead to 9-0. Baligod would score the game’s final run on a Tyler Garewal single.

Bryce Smolen (3-2) earned the win for the Golden Eagles after going the distance and striking out 10 batters while scattering five hits. Connor Meilock (2-3) was tagged with the loss for Oakland (5-16, 0-1) after giving up six earned runs and 10 hits in five innings.

ORU and Oakland resume play at 2 p.m. Saturday.