ROMEOVILLE, Ill. - The nonconference baseball game between IU Kokomo and Lewis University ended in a tie game, 10-10 in 11 innings Wednesday (March 28) at Brennan Field.

It was a balanced offensive attack for the Flyers as Brandon Post (Elk Grove Village, Ill./Elk Grove), Connor Rutherford (DePere, Wis./DePere) (2 runs, 2 RBI), Sam Cybulski (Clarendon Hills, Ill./Lyons Township) (3 RBI), Trayvon Johnson (Berkeley, Ill./St. Joseph's) and Neal Tyrell (Minooka, Ill./Minooka) all finished with two hits each. Leading the pitchers were Robert Talarico (Joliet, Ill./Joliet West) and Matt McCauley (Oakville, Mo./St. John Vianney), who each pitched 1.1 scoreless innings, with McCauley striking out three and Talarico two.


The Cougars (15-15-1) opened the scoring with two runs in the top of the first, but the Flyers got one back in the bottom of the first as Rutherford homered to right field. Kokomo tallied a run in the second and the Flyers scored two runs in the third to tie the game at three. Rutherford hit a sacrifice fly to center, scoring Brandon Post (Elk Grove Village, Ill./Elk Grove), and Anthony Rios (Lemont, Ill./St. Laurence) scored on a wild pitch.

Kokomo scored runs in the fourth and fifth to regain a two-run lead, but the Flyers (7-14-1) came back in the bottom of the fifth with six runs to take a 9-5 lead. Rios drove home Matt Verdun (Homer Glen, Ill./St. Rita) to score the first run of the inning, then Sam Cybulski (Clarendon Hills, Ill./Lyons Township) gave Lewis its first lead at 7-5 with a bases-clearing double. Alex Kiszkowski (Schaumburg, Ill./Schaumburg) doubled home Cybulski and scored on a single by Tyrell.

But Lewis would give up four unearned runs in the top of the sixth as the score was tied at nine. That remained the score until the ninth inning when the Cougars took a 10-9 lead in the top half of the inning. Jermaine Terry (Plainfield, Ill./Plainfield South) answered that run with a solo home run in the bottom of the ninth to send the game into extra innings. Both teams had runners on second and third with one out in the 11th, but neither team could push across the winning run.

Lewis travels to Lebanon Friday (March 30) to play a double header against McKendree, starting at 12 p.m.