Baseball Pulls Away Late for Road Victory Over Missouri State

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – Behind a shutdown performance by its pitching staff and an offense that tallied nine runs over the final four innings, Missouri pulled away for a 10-1 nonconference victory over in-state rival Missouri State Tuesday evening at Hammons Field.

Dalton Bargo homered and drove in a pair of runs, and Hank Zeisler became the first Tiger to record two triples in a game since 2011. The duo led a contingent of four Mizzou hitters who logged multi-hit performances.

Matt Garcia (2-for-5) delivered hits in each of his first two plate appearances, while Ty Wilmsmeyer (2-for-4) added singles in his last two at-bats to help fuel the Tigers’ late charge.

Mizzou (21-11) also benefited from a strong effort from its pitching staff, as five hurlers combined to limit the Bears to one run on seven hits. Freshman right-hander Brock Lucas (2-0) retired nine of the 10 batters he faced over 3.0 shutout innings, and Kyle Potthoff scattered five hits over his 2.2 frames to keep the Bears scoreless through six innings.

The Tigers broke on top with a second-inning run, as Garcia sparked the two-out scoring opportunity with a double to left, before trotting home on Carlos Pena’s bloop single to right-center for a 1-0 advantage.

Lucas and Potthoff kept the Bears (16-15) in check through their six combined innings, giving the MU offense time to click. Lucas worked around a two-out Spencer Nivens double in the first before turning in back-to-back 1-2-3 innings to conclude his night.

Potthoff avoided trouble in the fourth, despite a pair of MSU hits, thanks in large part to a crucial outfield assist by Wilmsmeyer, who gunned down Nivens attempting to stretch a double into a triple.

Still leading 1-0, Mizzou mounted the game’s pivotal rally in the fifth, riding a Bargo solo shot to the first of three big innings down the stretch. After MSU reliever Forrest Barnes hit Trevor Austin with a pitch, Zeisler drove a run-scoring triple into the gap in right-center to make it a 3-0 game.

Following a walk to Dylan Leach, Zeisler scampered home on a double-steal attempt, capping the rally and making it a four-run Tiger lead.

MSU struck for its lone run on an Anthony Socci homer to left-center that cut the Tiger lead to 4-1 in the seventh.

But Mizzou went back to work immediately, scoring two times in the eighth, before putting the game out of reach by batting around and plating four runs in the ninth.

Luke Mann led off the eighth by launching a solo blast that cleared the wall in right-center to spark the Tiger offense. After drawing a one-out walk, Austin swiped his second base of the game, then scored on Leach’s single to extend the margin to 6-1.

The Tigers cashed in on a pair of walks, a throwing error and run-producing hits by Bargo and Zeisler to pull away in the ninth.

Austin Troesser and Nic Smith combined on 2 2/3 hitless innings to close out the victory—Mizzou’s 17th in 20 nonconference contests this season.

Nivens led MSU’s attack with a pair of doubles in four at-bats, while Zack Stewart added two hits for the Bears. Tyler Tscherter (3-3) shouldered the loss, despite allowing just one run on three hits with four strikeouts over 4.0 innings.

TIGER NOTEBOOK

• With the victory, Missouri improved to 30-31 all-time vs. Missouri State and 9-8 against the Bears at Hammons Field
• The Tigers also improve to 17-3 in nonconference contests this season
• Mizzou out-hit the Bears by an 11-7 margin, improving to 20-4 when out-hitting the opposition in 2023
• Lucas notched his second mound victory as a Tiger, running the combined pitching record of Mizzou’s five freshman hurlers (Lucas, Smith, Sam Horn, Logan Lunceford and Daniel Wissler) to 9-1 on the season
• Mann’s eighth-inning homer—the 38th of his career—moved him into a tie with Griffin Moore for the No. 5 position on Mizzou’s career home run list
• Leach extended his personal hit streak to six games
• Zeisler became the first Tiger hitter to triple twice in a game since Eric Garcia accomplished the feat on May 13, 2011 vs. Texas Tech
• Zeisler also registered his team-best eighth multi-RBI game
• Mizzou recorded five stolen bases in a contest for the first time since Feb. 19, 2022 vs. Nicholls State (6)
• The Tigers’ four-run ninth matched their biggest inning since March 22 vs. Kansas, when they plated five runs in the ninth inning
• Wilmsmeyer logged his team-leading 12th multi-hit performance of the season with his 2-for-4 effort
• With his 2-for-5 night, Garcia recorded his first multi-hit effort since March 10 vs. NJIT and now has hits in his last three games

UP NEXT

Mizzou travels to College Station, Texas to begin a three-game Southeastern Conference series with Texas A&M Thursday (April 13). First pitch for the nationally-televised contest on ESPNU is slated for 7 p.m. (Central).

FOLLOW THE TIGERS

For all the latest information on Mizzou baseball, please visit MUTigers.com. For up-to-the-minute updates, follow the Tigers on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.