In the first two days of the Southern Conference Baseball Tournament, Furman jumped on top early in recording a pair of wins. In a winner's bracket game Saturday, UNC Greensboro turned the tables on the Paladins. The Spartans led 6-0 after two innings and held on for a 12-8 win to take the wheel of the tournament driver's seat.
The victory advanced third-seeded UNCG (34-21) to Sunday's championship. Furman will have to play again Saturday night to try to stay alive and set up a rematch with UNCG. The Paladins (31-27) will face the survivor of a loser's bracket game between sixth-seeded Samford and seventh-seeded ETSU.
UNCG leadoff man Ben Spitznagel, who's tortured Furman throughout his career, lined Matthew Quarles' first pitch to right for a single. Tripp Shelton deposited the next pitch over the left-centerfield wall and the Spartans led 2-0 two pitches in.
UNCG sent eight men to the plate in the next inning. Shelton capped the four-run frame with a two-run single.
Furman began to chip away in the middle innings. Jason Costa hit a two-run homer in the fourth, and Cameron Whitehead got a wind-assisted two-run homer in the fifth to cut the lead to 6-4.
The wind was blowing the same way in the bottom of the fifth though, and helped UNCG answer on a two-run homer by Andrew Moritz. Billy Greenfield came on in relief of Quarles later in the inning and allowed a run-scoring hit off the Green Monster. Carter Grote threw out Caleb Webster trying to stretch it into a double to end the inning.
A four-run seventh got the Paladins right back in it. Sky Overton had a run-scoring bunt single, Carter Grote walked with the bases loaded, Landon Kay had a run-scoring groundout and a bases-loaded passed ball cut UNCG's lead to 9-8.
After pulling to within one, Furman turned the ball over to ace pitcher Will Gaddis. Gaddis, who threw just 57 pitches in his start Wednesday, held the Spartans in check until a three-run eighth inning. UNCG got a bases-loaded groundout for one run and two more runs thanks to an error on a grounder that would've ended the inning.
Furman's best chance to score after the sixth came in the eighth when the Paladins loaded the bases. UNCG reliever Jack Maynard struck out Jason Costa though to end the threat. Maynard allowed just one single and no runs in the final 3 2/3 innings to record his third save.
Quarles (6-5) allowed nine earned runs on 10 hits in 4 2/3 innings to suffer the loss.
Jake Crawford had three hits to lead Furman, which collected 13 hits pushing its tournament total to 47 hits in three games.
Spitznagel, Shelton and Webster each had three hits for the Spartans.
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