Box Score 1 | Box Score 2 LAREDO, Texas (April 6, 2018) – After a disappointing loss in the series opener at Texas A&M International on Friday afternoon, Oklahoma Christian played a little home-run derby in the second game to earn a doubleheader split.

TAMIU scored a walk-off 6-5 win at Jorge Haynes Field in the first game, but Kyle Bottger, Jake Collins and Brice Smith each homered to lift OC past the Dustdevils 10-5 to even the series heading into another doubleheader on Saturday starting at noon.

OC (13-16, 4-6 Heartland Conference) spent much of the first game playing catch-up after TAMIU (12-19, 4-6) jumped to a 3-0 lead in the first inning. OC finally caught the Dustdevils at 3-3 on Chad Kennedy's RBI double in the top of the fifth.

TAMIU went back ahead in the bottom of the fifth, taking advantage of two OC errors to score two runs. The Eagles bounced back again, tying the game 5-5 in the top of the sixth on a sacrifice fly by Collins.

The Dustdevils had one more outburst in them, though, and it came in the bottom of the seventh inning against OC reliever Matthew Fusselman (0-2). Daniel Espinosa drew a leadoff walk and went to second base on a bunt single by Ricky Gonzalez. Fusselman then hit Jorge Napoles with a pitch to load the bases before Mathew Trevino singled to left field to score Espinosa with the winning run.

TAMIU reliever Coleman Butler (1-0) picked up the pitching win.

Collins homered in the first inning of the second game before the Dustdevils jumped on OC starter Skyler Martin (4-2) for three first-inning runs. But Martin settled down and allowed only one more run during his six-inning stint on the mound.

Meanwhile, the Eagles started scoring in bunches. Kolton Brown hit an RBI double and scored on a single by Smith to tie the game at 3-3 in the third inning. In the fourth, Bottger hit a two-run homer over the right-field fence off TAMIU reliever Nick Montemayor (0-1) to put OC ahead.

Smith smacked a two-run homer in the fifth to make it 7-3. In the sixth, Ryan Ward hit a two-run double before scoring on a triple by Brown. The Eagles finished the game with 14 hits, with Bottger, Ward, Kennedy, Brown and Smith recording two each. Bottger had five hits in the doubleheader.

Luke Reynolds pitched the final three innings to record his first save of the baseball season for OC.