DeKALB, IL – The Northern Illinois University baseball team had to settle for a split of its four-game weekend series with the Ohio Bobcats on Sunday after the Bobcats won Sunday's finale by a score of 10-6 at Ralph McKinzie Field.
 
"We took a step forward this weekend," said head coach Mike Kunigonis. "We'd been sputtering a little bit and especially after Friday, to do what we did yesterday and to come and play the way we did is a good step. We were one pitch, one hit, one defensive play away from things potentially being flipped today. We didn't get the result we wanted, but the score doesn't dictate how the game went today."
 
NIU (7-23, 6-10 MAC) took a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first as a Dylan Lonteen (Peoria, Ill./Illinois Central College) double scored Jake Dunham (Plainfield, Ill./Plainfield North) for the Huskies' second run. Ohio got on the board in the top of the third when Treyben Funderberg scored from third on a Ryan Anderson (Palatine, Ill./McHenry CC) wild pitch. The Huskies got the run back in the bottom of the inning when Eric Erato (Sussex, Wis./Sussex Hamilton) put down a bunt up the first base line to score Dunham and put NIU up 3-1.
 
Ohio (17-13, 11-9 MAC) tied the game in the top of the fourth with a two-run home run by Aaron Levy to make the score 3-3. The Huskies took back the lead 4-3 on a Matt Barnes (Bloomington, Ill./Heartland CC) RBI single in the bottom of the fourth. NIU had a chance to build on the lead in the fifth with a runner at third and one out, but Ohio reliever Chase Harris retired the next two batters to get out of the inning.
 
The Bobcats tied the game 4-4 in the sixth on a Levy RBI single to right field. Ohio loaded the bases with one out and took the lead when a Funderburg double down the right field line scored Levy and Spencer Harbert to make the score 6-4. An Isaiah Peterson RBI groundout extended the Bobcats lead to 7-4. Harris made that lead hold up, allowing two hits over the next three innings as Ohio added three insurance runs to take a 10-4 lead heading into the bottom of the ninth. Kam Smith (Colonial Beach, Va./The Steward School) hit a two-run home run in the ninth to make the score 10-6, but that would be as close as NIU got.
 
The Huskies had 13 hits in the game, with Dunham and Lonteen both going 3-for-5 at the plate. Barnes was 2-for-4 with an RBI as Brendan Joyce (South Elgin, Ill./Parkland College) was 2-for-3 with a pair of doubles. Anderson took the loss, allowing six runs in 5.1 innings on nine hits with a walk and three strikeouts. Harris earned the win for Ohio, allowing two runs in 4.1 innings with three stikeouts and four hits.
 
NIU opens a four-game series at Ball State on Friday, April 23 at 2 p.m.
 
--NIU--