Pride drop Heart Tournament opener against MidAmerica Nazarene

OZARK, Mo. - Returning to the Heart of America Athletic Conference Tournament for the second-straight season, the Clarke University baseball team was unable to get off to a strong start in a 15-5 loss to MidAmerica Nazarene University on Thursday afternoon in Ozark, Mo.

Offensively, the Pride were unable to get the bats going, producing four hits in the seven inning run rule loss but they did have plenty of traffic on the bases, walking nine times and getting hit by one pitch as they put a runner on base in five of the seven innings and had multiple runners on in four of those five innings.

Unfortunately for CU, the Pioneers jumped out to an early five-run lead scoring those five runs in the top of the first then added two more runs in the second after Clarke got a run back in the first to lead 7-1 after two innings.

There was still fight in the Pride as they produced a four-run bottom of the third inning to cut the lead to just two runs at 7-5, but couldn't get any closer than that before MNU added a pair in the fifth, three more in the six, and another three spot in the seventh to reach that 10-run margin to end the game early.

The run production came off of a Jaxon Brooks single and an error in the Pioneer outfield that plated a pair of run, a Jordan Breen bases loaded walk, and a sacrifice fly from Cole Swartz with Ethan Hefel producing the lone multi-hit game, going 2-for-2 with a pair of walks and a run and Eli Kelley getting that last hit for CU in the game.

In the double elimination format, Clarke will turn around to play the first game of Friday's slate of games in Ozark when they will match up with Peru State College at 10:00 a.m. CT at Ozark Sports Complex in a rematch of the regular season finale series from just last weekend.