RICHARDSON, TX (03.10.10) – For most of Wednesday's non-conference game with Wabash College, UTD cleanup hitter Kyle Guest was having a day to forget at the plate. Facing the depressing possibility of finishing the afternoon 0-for-5 with three strikeouts, though, the Comet sophomore laced the first pitch he saw from reliever Craig Austin into leftfield for a 2-RBI single that sparked an 8th inning UTD rally ending with another Comet (10-5) win.

Guest's two-out line drive brought home Garet Norton and Jacob Starnes to break a 7-7 tie, then Guest scored the fourth run of the inning on a followup single from Adam Hudec to lead the Comets to an eventual 10-8 win.

Until that point, the Comets and Little Giants (1-5) from the Indiana school had traded runs and leads with Wabash taking a 7-6 advantage in the top of the 7th. Both the Wabash starter Keegan Leckrone and reliever Andrew Swart (2-0) left the game with leads, but Swart was responsible for both Norton and Starnes and took the loss.

Larry Bolding an infielder-turned-pitcher who was solid in both this game and a Monday night win against No. 14 Marietta (OH), was in position to pick up his first win of the season. Adam Spinn came back with a solid 9th inning to pick up his 5th save of the season.

Coming off five games over the weekend, Comet coach Shane Shewmake used the “Johnny Wholestaff” approach to pitching in the non-conference affair, sending six pitchers to the mount for no more than two innings each. Before Bolding, two had left with a lead, and two others potentially on the hook for a loss.

Randy Lorber hit the first of his two doubles on the day in the 1st inning, scoring when Joseph Killgore followed with a single. Wabash answered, though, in the 2nd, taking a 2-1 lead in an inning that featured three hit batters and an RBI walk.

Three doubles from Starnes (who was 3-for-5), Lorber and Drew Hallford in the 3rd set the stage for three UTD runs and the Comets were back on top, 4-2, after three. But UTD let the Little Giants right back in the game in the 4th, giving up a run on an error on a potential double play. Wabash tacked on two more runs in the 5th on three hits to go up, 5-4.

The Comets got those back and retook control, 6-5 in the 6th when Hallford was hit by a pitch and Clint Dunham followed with a two-run home run over the leftfield wall. A leadoff homerun from Wabash's John Pennington opened the door to a two-run inning in the 7th, and set the stage for the 8th inning eruption. Adam Spinn struck out the first two hitters he faced in the 9th before giving up anther Wabash homerun.

UTD opens American Southwest Conference East Division play with a three-game series this Friday and Saturday against the University of the Ozarks.


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