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Box Score 2
SEARCY – Harding received two outstanding pitching performances Sunday and earned a doubleheader sweep of Arkansas Tech on the final day of the 2006 season. The Bisons won 3-1 and 2-1 and completed the year with a 21-28 record and a 6-17 mark in the GSC, two more conference wins than in the 2005 campaign.
Harding junior Justin Phillips (5-4) struck out seven and pitched his team-high fifth complete game of the season to pick up the win in game one.
Arkansas Tech (19-29, 6-17) plated their only run in the top of the first inning. Heath Rosenberry was hit by the first pitch of the game and came around to score on Craig Cameron’s single to left field.
Harding tied the game at 1-1 in the bottom of the second. Senior Clay Kiihnl’s infield groundout scored Adam Darby from third.
Wonder Boy starter Bryan Eagle (1-2) kept the game tied until the seventh inning. Kiihnl doubled to right center and scored on Bo Whitaker’s triple.
Eagle pitched 6.1 innings and allowed six hits and two runs. The Bisons tacked on an insurance run in the eighth off Tech reliever Blake Bailey. Zach Fisher was hit by a pitch to lead off the inning. He moved to second on Darby’s single through the right side and scored on Ryan Moody’s double to left.
Senior Mike Davis continued the solid pitching for Harding in game two, going 5.0 innings and allowing only three hits and one run. He walked one and struck out three. He left after giving up the first run of the game in the top of the sixth. His brother, Jeff Davis (5-3), came on in relief and pitched two perfect innings to collect the win.
After Tech scored in the top of the sixth, Kiihnl drove in Darby with a single through the left side. In the bottom of the next frame, freshman Ben Wimberly gave Harding the win with a one-out single that scored pinch-runner Blake Robertson with the winning run.
Harding stole three bases in the doubleheader to finish the season with a school-record 89 swipes.
