LOVES PARK, Ill. – If you subscribe to the theory that the outcomes of close baseball games are virtually random, then eventually these coin flips need to start coming up in favor of the Edgewood College baseball team. The Eagles found themselves on the short end of two more close games on Sunday against Rockford College. The Eagles were tied late in each game, but fell 9-8 in the opener and 5-3 in the nightcap.

In the first game, Edgewood College (11-23, 9-11 NAC) starting pitcher Nate Averill was cruising along through the first six innings and holding a 2-1 lead thanks to a Zack Creekmore RBI double and an RBI single from Andrew Lauritzen in the fourth inning. In the seventh, the Regents finally touched Averill for two runs on four hits to take a 3-2 lead. Averill finished the game with three earned runs allowed in seven innings pitched.

Ryan O'Dell came up big in the top of the eighth inning. O'Dell solo blast to right field, his third of the season, tied the game at 3-3. However, things turned ugly for the Eagles in the bottom of the inning. After a strikeout to open the inning, the next nine Rockford College (17-17, 15-5 NAC) batters reached base, on five hits, three hit batters and an Eagle fielding error. When the smoke cleared, the Regents had a commanding 9-3 lead heading into the ninth inning.

Edgewood College wasn't ready to go down without a fight. Lauritzen started the rally with a double and the Eagles and eventually scored on a Marc Ostrowski ground ball. A Kody Parman single brought in another run. After Alex Jaskulski walked, Jake Zadra was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded to make the score 9-6. With bases still loaded, Creekmore singled up the middle to score two runs. However, the rally died with next batter on fly ball to end the game.

Lauritzen went 4-for-5 with a double to lead the Edgewood College hitting attack. Creekmore had three hits with a double and three runs batted in. Jaskulski went 2-for-4. Aaron Schmidt came on to start the eighth inning and suffered the loss.

The second game was a slightly less wild version of the first, with the Eagles rallying to tie the game, only to watch it slip away again. Rockford College finally got to Eagle starter Trevor Koehn in the sixth inning, after Koehn had held them to just two hits through the first five innings. The Regents tallied three runs with the help of a pair of Edgewood College errors to take the first lead of the game.

However, the Eagles brought out the big sticks in the seventh inning. After Parman was hit by a pitch and advanced to second on a wild pitch, Jaskulski doubled him home. Zadra followed with an RBI double of his own and the Eagles tied the game 3-3 on an O'Dell triple into the right center field gap.

In the bottom of the seventh inning, an Eagle error opened the door to two unearned runs for the Regents. Cole Logemann provided the knockout blow for the Regents with a two-out, two-run double. In the ninth inning, Will Schlosser led off with a pinch hit single and was lifted for pinch runner Pat Manning. Manning advanced to second base with one out on a Rockford error, but the Eagles final two batters were retired to end the game.

Jaskulski went 3-for-5 with a double for the Eagles. Zadra and Brad Clark each had a double to go with O'Dell's triple. Koehn was saddled with the loss despite allowing just six hits over 6.2 innings and striking out five batters.

Edgewood College has now lost six games in a row and has slipped to eighth place in the NAC standings. With just two conference games left, the Eagles will need to sweep Lakeland next Saturday and hope for help from the teams in front of them. Edgewood College also have a non-conference game against UW-Platteville on Tuesday and their final home games of the season, a doubleheader versus Ripon College on Wednesday.