Justin Vossos launched two home runs, including the game-winning shot in extra innings as the Texas State Bobcats came from behind and took a 5-4 victory against the Marshall Thundering Herd to conclude the regular season Saturday afternoon at Irvine-Rasmussen Ballpark.
The Bobcats (34-22, 16-14 SBC) capped off an explosive weekend of the bat with an additional three home runs to continue adding to their already far-extending single season program record for home runs in a season with 108, good for eighth in the nation. Alongside an explosive victory, senior pitcher Alizah Gutierrez had his best pitching of the season with a six-inning shutout performance, giving up two hits and striking out three.
On the other hand, the Thundering Herd (23-31, 13-17 SBC) had their best chance of salvaging this final weekend series but failed to capitalize, ending their regular season on a four-game losing streak after another pitching collapse against Texas State’s offense.
Marshall struck the first punch right from the go, as junior center fielder Evan Bottone took the second pitch of the ballgame into deep right field to give the Thundering Herd an early lead. Shortly after, graduate right fielder Jackson Halter further extended their lead with a home run of his own to make it 2-0.
They doubled up their lead in the third inning after getting on base with two-consecutive base hits by taking advantage of a throwing error from freshman starting pitcher Cade Smith, who overthrew junior first basemen Jaquae Stewart on a pick-off attempt, allowing an additional run to score.
Immediately afterwards, Halter added on their fourth run of the game with an RBI double. Smith’s day was done and in-came Gutierrez to hold the fort while waiting for his offense to wake up.
In the bottom of the fifth, freshman left fielder Blake Beheler cut the deficit in half with a two-run bomb into left, hitting his second home run of the season. The next time the Bobcats came up to bat, Vossos struck a two-out home run into center-left to make it a 4-3 game.
After a few quiet innings of work for both teams, the bottom of the eighth became quite busy. After freshman catcher Clayton Namken got on with a single and Fryman flew out to make two outs, the Thundering Herd called to the bullpen and subbed out freshman-for-freshman as Davis Gunn took over for Landen Doll after 1 2/3 innings. From there, Gunn walked Vossos, hit senior third basemen Chase Mora and ultimately loaded the bases for sophomore shortstop Brady Boles. Boles would take four straight pitches and walk to first, knotting the score at four-apiece.
In the ninth, Texas State switched Gutierrez with junior Jesus Tovar after a leadoff walk, who did hold down the fort in the two innings he pitched, relinquishing no hits or walks.
The last game of the regular season went into extra innings after a relatively silent time at the plate for both.
In the bottom of the tenth, Vossos squared up on the first pitch he saw and smacked it into deep left field to not only complete Texas State’s come-from-behind victory but also the weekend sweep as well with much-needed momentum going into the postseason.
The Bobcats, winning their sixth straight conference game dating back to last weekend’s road affair against Arkansas State from May 1-3, finished sixth in the Sun Belt Conference and won just enough to squeeze out of playing in the SBC’s single-elimination first round in-part thanks to having a tiebreaker against Louisiana-Lafayette, earning the sixth seed in the double-elimination part of the bracket.
Texas State will enter the SBC Postseason Tournament looking to not just hopefully take home their last hardware from the Sun Belt but also with hopes of improving their chances for a potential at-large bid as a team that is certainly on the bubble.
They are set to begin their postseason run against third-seed App State at 9 a.m. Wednesday, May 20 at Dabos Stadium in Montgomery, Ala. The game will be streamed on ESPN+.
