March 12, 2021

By John Lock

Southern Illinois

CARBONDALE, Ill. - The No. 25-ranked Southern Illinois Salukis scored 10 runs in the fifth inning of a 14-5 win over the Evansville Purple Aces in the Missouri Valley Conference opener on Friday afternoon at Itchy Jones Stadium. SIU improved to 12-0 with the win, the best start in program history, and won its 17th-straight game dating back to last season.

SIU (12-0, 1-0 MVC) trailed 5-1 in the fifth inning with the bases loaded and one out with a 1-1 count on Tristan Peters. Nine pitches later, the Salukis had an 8-5 lead. Peters (Winkler, Man.) hit a two-run single up the middle. Vinni Massaglia followed with a three-run homer. On the very next pitch, Philip Archer hit a solo homer; and four pitches later, J.T. Weber provided the back end of the back-to-back-to-back homers.

“The offence can get you in multiple ways,” SIU head coach Lance Rhodes said. “We don’t swing at a ton of bad pitches right now. We have some thunder from top to bottom. On a day like today when the wind is blowing out pretty good, we have some guys who can leave the yard and change the game in the blink of an eye.”

And the Salukis did it against tough competition. Evansville (6-7, 0-1 MVC) came into the game winners of five of their last eight games. The Aces beat a nationally ranked Georgia team on the season’s opening day at Georgia’s home ballpark. Evansville’s ace Shane Gray, who was the pitcher who beat Georgia, came into the day 2-0 with a 1.06 ERA, and he was solid against SIU through four innings today until the avalanche of the fifth inning.

“We were able to get in some hitter’s counts in the middle innings and do some damage,” Rhodes said. “That’s the thing I talk about with our offense all the time: One after another, it’s a tough AB. It’s hard for a pitcher to lock in for three, four, or five hitters in a row if we can stay to our plan.”

The Salukis weren’t through scoring in the fifth inning. After Weber’s homer chased Gray (4 1/3 IP, 8H, 8R, 7ER), Cody Cleveland drew a walk, and Austin Ulick hit a double. Ian Walters hit a sac fly to score Cleveland, and Evan Martin hit SIU’s fourth home run of the inning to give SIU a 10-run inning. SIU came into the fifth inning trailing 5-1 and left it with an 11-5 lead.

While SIU’s offence stole the show with a four-homer inning, Tanner Lewis was outstanding out of the bullpen. SIU starter Mike Hansell struggled after a 1-2-3 first inning. Evansville scored two runs in the second, one in the third, and two more in the fourth when some ground balls with runners on base found holes. Four of Evansville’s five runs came with two outs, giving Evansville a 5-1 lead after four innings. But Lewis relieved Hansell and was dynamic, striking out five and allowing just one hit in 3.2 innings out of the bullpen.

Peters extended his hitting streak to 10 games and has nine multi-hit games already this season, including five-straight multi-hit games including today .