FARMVILLE, Va. – Longwood baseball put up five runs for a third straight game, but UNC Asheville answered every time to take the series finale 7-5.
 
Cooper Smith was the story for the day for Asheville (16-20, 4-8 Big South) as the righthander tossed a complete game to get the win.
 
Meanwhile, Ben Pulliam banged out three base hits, and Bentley Yeatts added two for Longwood (21-15, 6-6 Big South), with Yeatts driving a pair of runs.
 
SCORING:
               R             H            E
UNCA    7             11           2
LWU      5             8             0
 
HOW IT HAPPENED:
 
The game was death by a thousand cuts on offense, as both teams combined for 12 runs on 19 hits, but neither side ever scored more than two runs in an inning.
 
Longwood struck first after Pulliam led off with a double in the second inning. Yeatts drove him home with an RBI single to center.
 
Asheville answered with a run in the third, as Jake Pereira doubled home a run. Pereira had a huge day, going 3-3 with two RBI and two runs.
 
From that point on, both sides answered runs with runs through the middle innings of the game.
 
Jake Minarik cranked a solo home run for Asheville in the fourth, but Longwood answered when Pulliam again doubled and came home on an error three batters later.
 
Asheville took a two-run lead in the fifth, but Jon Howard doubled home a run before Jayson Nash tied the game at 4-4 with a sacrifice fly.
 
Both sides also scored in the sixth, with Yeatts knotting the score at five with his second RBI single of the day.
 
However, Asheville took the lead for good in the seventh on an RBI base hit from Tyler Parks that made it 6-5.
 
Smith (2-3) made sure it stuck. The sturdy righty retired nine of the final 10 batters he faced in the final three innings to finish off the complete game, his second of the season. He finished with five strikeouts against one walk and eight hits, and he gave up five runs with only three earned.
 
Cam Freeman (1-1) took the loss for Longwood after giving up the go-ahead run in the top of the seventh. He struck out two in 1.2 innings of work.
 
WHAT THEY SAID:
 
"Excited about the weekend," said Longwood Head Coach Ray Noe. "We got two of three at home. Two of three and home and one in three on the road is kind of the formula for success, and we've been able to do that so far. Obviously, we wanted to get greedy today and go get it, but credit them. Their guy went nine innings. A CG's pretty impressive. And then some two-out hits, and they did a good job with the sac bunt game, getting guys in scoring position and taking advantage of it. That's part of it. I didn't think we played poorly. They just made some big hits when they needed, and, unfortunately, we didn't."
 
"Absolutely," Noe added about being process oriented instead of results driven. "Even Jack McMullan's at bat there in the eighth. He hits a home run foul on a change-up, and then he ends up popping up to the shortstop. His plan of being on the change-up. They had flipped a bunch of right-on-right change-ups and sliders from Smith, and I could see that plan in action. I told him, he was upset with the out, but if he continues to do that, he's going to have the success that he's had all year. Always the process. The results will come if we continue to stick to what we do. Have an approach, do what we do day to day, and it will take care of itself."
 
"Bentley's been trending really well," Noe said of the Lancer third baseman. "He got some looks at Radford. I thought he did a great job. He plays incredibly hard. I'm really proud of him. He hadn't been in the mix early, and then he's just a guy who kind of finds his way into it. My favorite thing about him is he is very consistent. You know what you are going to get. He's ready to go offensively when you need him to, but he'll also reel it back in when he's really locked into the approach, and he'll wear some pitches for us like he did last night and put a good swing with a two-out, two RBI single when we needed it last night. And a sac fly. He's a ball player."
 
"Looking to hopefully get the season sweep after we played William & Mary here and beat them, so looking to do it again on the road," Noe said about the team over the next week. "Hopefully we can take care of business on Tuesday, but then refocus. Everything is in front of us. I think we're at fourth or fifth, depending on how the day goes, in the standings, and we just want to keep afloat in that. Having Presbyterian here, we've had some success here. We're 15-4 at home, so hopefully we can keep that winning luck going and keep playing good baseball in conference."
 
UP NEXT:
 
Longwood heads to William & Mary for a Tuesday matchup, with first pitch at 6 p.m. in Williamsburg, Va. The team returns home to host Presbyterian next weekend.
 
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