Lee University completed a Southern States Athletic Conference baseball series sweep of Southern Polytechnic with 6-5 and 7-0 victories Saturday at Olympic Field in Cleveland, but the first one was harder than it needed to be.
Three of the Hornets’ five runs off star left-handed pitcher Patrick Merkling were unearned, and Lee — ranked third in the NAIA after a brief stay at No. 1 — had to score two runs in the bottom of the seventh.
Mike Moore was 2-for-3 and batted in two runs, the second one ending the game with a sacrifice fly, and Trevor Burgess and Brady Renner also had two hits each for the Flames (39-6-1, 21-3) in game one. In the finale, Blake Barber was 2-for-4 with three RBIs, Renner was 3-for-4 and scored twice and Burgess was 2-for-3. Vance Spilker, Kyle Briner and Andy Hillis combined to pitch the shutout.
• Tennessee Wesleyan 5-6, Point 0-2: At East Point, Ga., the NAIA’s 10th-ranked Bulldogs improved to 31-8 overall and 14-1 in the Appalachian Athletic Conference with the doubleheader sweep after winning 7-2 on Friday. Point is 22-19, 8-9.
• Cumberland 5-6, Bryan 0-1: At Lebanon, Tenn., the visiting Lions — a Tennessee NAIA program on the rise — managed only three hits in each game and totaled five errors while the tradition-rich Bulldogs (22-19) had six hits in each game and scored in the latter innings. Mike Mandarino pitched the second three-hitter with 11 strikeouts and helped himself by going 2-for-3 with a homer and two RBIs. Bryan is 31-13.