NORMAL, Ill. – The Northern Illinois University baseball team scored five runs in the final three innings Wednesday afternoon but could not overcome an early deficit in a 16-12 loss to the Illinois State Redbirds at Duffy Bass Field.
 
Wednesday's game was the first for NIU head coach Ryan Copeland against his alma mater. Copeland was a pitcher for the Redbirds from 2007-2010 and started his coaching career at Illinois State in 2014.
 
"When I got here, I started thinking about all of the great memories I was able to create with my teammates as a player and coaching here," Copeland said. "As the day went on with pregame there were a lot of people here that were here when I was a player that came out to catch up. It was a little weird being in the opposite dugout but once the game got going, it just became baseball and trying to win a game."
 
NIU (7-14) got off to a very fast start Wednesday. Freshman Charlie Parcell (Des Plaines, Ill./Maine West) led off the game with a home run over the right field fence on the very first pitch of the game. The Redbirds responded with four runs in the bottom of the first,
highlighted by two-run double off the bat of first baseman Judah Morris, to take a 4-1 lead.
 
Illinois State (10-9) put four more runs on the board in the bottom of the second. J.T. Sokolove led off with a home run down the left field line. Daniel Pacella drove in a run with a groundout to Jake Nelson (Altoona, Wis./Madison College) at second base, followed by a Noah Rabin two-run home run over the right field fence that made the score 8-1.
 
The Huskies scored with two outs in the top of the third. Nelson tripled to centerfield with Eric Erato (Sussex, Wis./Sussex Hamilton) driving him in with a base hit up the middle to put the score at 8-2. Illinois State answered with two runs in the bottom half of the inning to go up 10-2.
 
NIU came alive for four runs in the top of the fourth. Cooper Cohn (McHenry, Ill.) was hit by a pitch leading off the inning. JP Gauthier (De Pere, Wis./Illinois State) followed with a double to left center as Cohn scored all the way from first base to make the score 10-3. Christian Seegers (Schaumburg, Ill./Creighton) drove in Gauthier with a single to center, then came home on a two-run home run from Andre Demetral (Rochester, Mich./Florence Darling Tech) that got NIU within four, 10-6. Ben Dandelet entered the game from the Redbirds bullpen and got the first two outs of the inning before an Erato single extended the inning. He reached second on a wild pitch as Mason Kelley (Mt. Washington, Ky./Schoolcraft College) drew a walk. Dandelet got a flyout to end the Huskies' threat.
 
"We've been waiting for Andre to get going," Copeland said. "He's been really good about getting on base. He was all over the barrel today which is good to see, especially knowing that he's been up towards the top of the lineup for the most part to get that production. This was a big game for JP too, obviously starting his career at Illinois State. He did a good job staying within himself, took a couple of walks, and hit a home run which hopefully gets him going."
 
Demetral drove in his third run of the game in the top of the fifth with an RBI double that made the score 12-7. After Illinois State scored a run in the sixth to go up six 13-7, NIU put three runs on the board in the top of the seventh. With the bases loaded and one out, Parcell hit a sacrifice fly to centerfield to drive in Cohn. A Nelson infield single scored Gauthier and an Erato single brought in Demetral to make the score 13-10, but that would be as close as NIU would get.
 
Erato was 3-for-5 with two RBI, a walk and a stolen base. Gauthier and Demetral combined to go 4-for-7 with six RBI as each Huskie hit his first home run of the year.
 
NIU takes on Miami this weekend in Mid-American Conference play. The two programs announced on Tuesday that the series had been shifted to Oxford, Ohio due to the cold weather forecast for this weekend in DeKalb. The series begins on Friday, March 22 at 2 p.m. CT with the games on Saturday, March 23 and Sunday, March 24 starting at 12 p.m. CT.
 
--NIU--