CHARLESTON, S.C. – Longwood baseball was locked in a pitcher's duel to open a three-game series at The Citadel on Thursday morning.
 
Unfortunately for the Lancers (18-12), two-out base knocks powered The Citadel (13-15) past Longwood 6-3.
 
Brogan Jones, Jon Howard and Ben Pulliam drove in the runs for the Lancers, but all six runs for the home side came with two outs at the plate.
 
SCORING:
               R             H            E
LWU      3             6             0
CIT         6             8             0
 
HOW IT HAPPENED:
 
Longwood opened up with an early lead in the top of the first as the top of the order got on. Howard poked the first run in with an RBI groundout, and Pulliam added an RBI double down the line for a 2-0 lead.
 
However, The Citadel answered with a two-out rally to take a 3-2 lead in the home half of the inning of RBI base hits from Christian Stratis and Zach Hunt.
 
From there, Longwood freshman starter Jackson Garland settled down and started mowing batters down. The young righthander struck out a career-best seven in 5.2 innings of work, the longest outing of his young collegiate career.
 
Longwood tied the score in the fourth when Brogan Jones hit a screamer for an RBI single.
 
The Citadel took the lead on an RBI triple with two outs in the sixth from Garrett Fulmer, and two more runs in the eighth added some insurance.
 
Will Holmes (2-3) earned the win with six innings of work for The Citadel. He struck out seven while giving up three runs, all earned, on four hits and four walks. CJ Van Slooten picked up his second save of the season with one scoreless inning to close out the game.
 
Garland took the tough loss despite his seven strikeouts in 5.2 innings. He gave up four runs on five hits and two walks.

WHAT THEY SAID:

"I thought we played better baseball today as a whole," said Longwood Head Coach Ray Noe. "The pitchers attacked the zone for the most part, but our big weakness today was we needed to do a better job getting off the field with two outs."

"Offensively, I liked how we attacked them early, but we have to do a better job in the middle portion of the game," Noe added. "I felt like our at bats for the most part were good, but some lack of focus/competitiveness with two strikes resulted in some failed run-scoring opportunities."
 
UP NEXT:
 
The two teams play the second game of the three-game series on Friday afternoon. First pitch is set for 1 p.m.
 
#GoWood #HorsePower