Unearned runs trip up Tigers

photo Chattanooga State's Tyler McClure (25) tags Dyersburg State's Tyler Jackson (10) in a rundown between third and home in the top of the second inning at Chattanooga State Monday.

Chattanooga State has had much of its baseball success this baseball season by making key two-out plays. But Monday in the Tigers' opening game in the TCCAA/NJCAA Region VII tournament they are hosting, a two-out throwing error in the third inning led to six unearned runs and eventually a 9-7 victory for Dyersburg State.

Chattanooga State (39-18) will play Motlow at 10 this morning. The Bucks lost 6-5 when nationally 10th-ranked Walters State scored three runs in the bottom of the ninth inning in Monday's first game.

Columbia State, ranked fourth in NJCAA Division I, beat Southwest Tennessee and plays at 7 tonight - weather permitting - against the winner of Monday's late game between Volunteer State and Jackson State. Walters is scheduled to face Dyersburg at 4 p.m.

Dyersburg, now 3-1 against the third-seeded Tigers this season, took a 2-0 lead in the top of the second inning when Chase Jones doubled down the right-field line and Seth Hinson tripled to deep right-center field and scored on a error on a grounder to shortstop by Pat Schloss.

But Chattanooga State tied the score in its next at-bat with a typical two-out rally. Daniel Tucker walked and Matt Tobin got a hit to right field and took second on a throwaway at third, and Tyler Garner singled in the tying run past the pitcher.

In the third, though, Tobin skipped a two-out throw past the first baseman, and Hinson was hit by a pitch. Tyler Jackson followed with soft liner to left that brought in two runs, and Schloss and Jonathan Moody grounded singles through the left side before Nick Newell lined another RBI hit into right-center.

The Tigers fought back with a run in the sixth and two each in the seventh and eighth but couldn't get the tying run to the plate in the ninth.

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