There was "free baseball" at Baylor on Tuesday - the last thing anyone huddled and covered in the stands or shivering on the field or in the dugouts really wanted.
Coming from two down to tie the Division II East/Middle opener in the bottom of the seventh inning, Baylor pulled out a 5-4 victory over McCallie on a ninth-inning balk.
For the opening pitch, the temperature hovered at 33 degrees and snow was falling - not spitting but falling - and the snow fell off and on into the ninth.
The two rivals continue their three-game series at 6 tonight at McCallie and return to Baylor on Thursday for the finale.
Baylor leadoff man Ricky Levy worked a walk to lead off the ninth. Gunnar Ricketts' bunt attempt was popped up and caught, but an attempt to double Levy up at first went high, allowing him to advance to third.
Looking to get an attempt to force Levy at home or to turn a double play, McCallie intentionally loaded the bases, and Levy proceeded to score on the balk.
"The game could've been well out of hand in the first three innings, but our kids did a really good job of minimizing their big innings," Baylor coach Billy Berry said.
His Red Raiders took the lead in the bottom of the first when Ricketts was hit by a pitch, advanced to second on a walk to Teddy Lepcio and scored from second on a two-out single to left by Gehrig Ebel.
McCallie retaliated immediately.
Ethan Bean knotted the score on a towering home run through spitting snow to left-center. Cameron Costo singled, Dane Beard reached on an error and Ethan Hailey loaded the bases on a bunt single. Daalen Adderly's sacrifice fly scored Costo, and Beard followed on Corbin Brooksbanks' single to left.
McCallie increased its lead to 4-1 in the third. Max Riemer singled and Costo's single to left-center brought him home.
"After we scored four runs it seemed like we went dead," new McCallie coach Tim Costo said. "We left a lot of runners in scoring position with less than two outs, which is unacceptable. We can't do that in this league and expect to win. Teams are too good."
With no outs in the fourth, the Blue Tornado stranded runners at third and second. They got the leadoff man on in the first and failed to get him across, and they had runners and second and first with two outs and couldn't score either one.
Baylor closed within two on Stan King's fourth-inning home run to right and forced extra innings with two runs in the seventh, the big plays being a single from Wilson Maclellan and Lepcio taking a bases-loaded hit-by-pitch.
"We preach all the time that the toughest guy is going to win, and we're trying to get them to take on that mantra," Berry said. "They showed it tonight, but hats off to McCallie. They're a good team and this is going to be a really good series."
Contact Ward Gossett at wgossett@timesfreepress.com or 423-886-4765. Follow him at Twitter.com/wardgossett.