Program vs. Program                                                                                                                                                    
Overall: ASU leads 23-9                                                                                                                                                
In Stephenville: ASU leads 10-5
2012: Tarleton State leads 2-1 (13-14, 10-6, 8-6)                                                                                                                                      
Last season: Tarleton State swept 3-0 (18-6, 11-1, 11-5)                                                                                   
 
SAN ANGELO, Texas – No. 8 Angelo State is forced to win on Sunday to salvage a Lone Star Conference series split after dropping a pair of games to Tarleton State on Saturday at the Cecil Ballow Baseball Complex.
 
Angelo State (28-12, 12-7 LSC) held leads in both games of Saturday's doubleheader, but were unable to hold on in 10-6 and 8-6 losses against Tarleton State (17-17, 9-10 LSC). Lee Neumann led the Rams' offense during the doubleheader, going 6-for-7 with his team-leading fifth home run of the season and tying Drew Caraway (2007) for the program's single-season record of seven triples with one in the day's first game. Brett Parsons, Zach Cohen and Ryan Greer each added four hits on the day for the Rams who will look to avoid losing more than two games in a row this season when the two teams return to action at 1 p.m. on Sunday for the series finale.
 
“We did a lot of good things today but we didn't handle the moment when we needed to get outs or get hits,” ASU head coach Kevin Brooks said. “We were more than in both of these games and we have to be the team that pulls these games out. We can't let anything slip like we did today the rest of the season.”
 
The day's first game looked to be Angelo State's to win throughout as the Rams jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the second inning and would add three more to take a 5-0 lead into the sixth inning. The Texans, who had struggled all day against Rams' starter Jake Feckley, were able to string together two single after their leadoff hitter was hit by a pitch. Feckley would be charged with five runs in the inning, while reliever Michael Weatherly (5-1) suffered his first loss of the season after giving up a two-run home run to Noah Rigenber that would give Tarleton its first lead of the game.
 
TSU finished the inning with seven hits and its 10 runs in the inning were the most the Rams have given up in a single inning all season. The Rams had previously only given up 27 runs in the sixth inning of its previous 39 games.
 
Neumann led Angelo State with three hits in the game, while Greer and Cohen each added two hits to the Rams' 12-hit total. Toby Semler doubled in the first inning to extend his hitting streak to nine games, while Tate Allison added two RBI on a double of his own.
 
“I thought we played really well by getting the lead and continuing to tack on runs,” Brooks said. “They got 10 runs and we gave them five of them. It's really disappointing to lose that game, but we played a lot better in it than we did yesterday.”
 
Ryan Small ended the nightcap with a two-run walk-off home run for the Texans against Austin Church (2-2). Church pitched 3.1 innings of relief for starter Michael Lange who left the game after giving up six hits and six runs. Church would surrender five hits – the final one resulting in the Small's game-winning home run.
 
Parsons, who was moved to third in the batting lineup for the day, had three hits in the game including his second home run of the season. Greer went 2-for-2 with two RBI, while Toby Semler had a hit in each game to extend his hitting streak to 10 for the Rams.