Two double-digit innings powered the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff past a baseball team led by a former player Wednesday afternoon.
UAPB defeated Arkansas Baptist 32-6 in seven innings at the Torii Hunter Baseball Complex in a rare matchup against an NAIA opponent.
Arkansas Baptist Coach JaKobi Jackson played for UAPB from 2022-24 and is now in his first season leading the Buffaloes (0-19). He said despite his team’s loss, it was a great experience to return to UAPB.
“I spent four years here,” Jackson said. “I got to play three years. Man, it was amazing. We had a great coaching staff. We had a great group of guys. Even my assistant coach, he’s a guy I met at UAPB. UAPB is just, it’s home to me. I’m from Pine Bluff. My mom went here. My grandfather went here. My brother went here, and I’m blessed to say that I went here, as well.”
This game was a late addition to the schedule. UAPB was looking for a new opponent after a scheduled March 11 road game at Memphis was canceled due to weather.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
UAPB Coach Logan Stout said neither Memphis nor UAPB was going to be able to make up that game, so he was receptive to playing Baptist when the Buffaloes first reached out to him.
“I was just trying to find an opponent where we could get guys some innings,” Stout said. “They actually reached out, … they said, ‘Coach, we’d love to play you guys.’ In all honesty, I didn’t know a lot about their team at all. I was like, ‘OK, let’s do it.’ It was fun to get to see them. Proud of them pouring into the next generation of players.”
UAPB (10-17) scored 13 runs in the first inning, four in the second and 15 in the fourth. The Golden Lions sent 18 hitters to the plate in the first, and every Golden Lion hitter reached base and later scored the first time through the lineup.
Baptist starting pitcher Juan Terrero exited the game after facing eight hitters without an out. Adonis Alcantara took over and faced six hitters with one out.
The final pitch Alcantara threw hit UAPB first baseman Ian Smith in the helmet, leading to multiple coaches and trainers coming out to check on him. He eventually got up and walked to first base before Lazaro Alvarado replaced him as a pinch runner.
Stout said Smith avoided any significant injury.
“It was purely precautionary,” Stout said. “We had actually planned to pull the starters, which we did. We just wanted to get one at-bat and then roll, and that’s what we did. So, he’s fine.”
The third Baptist pitcher of the inning was Jarvis Spearman, who finally started to calm things down. He got a fly ball against the first hitter he faced before hitting a batter and giving up a two-RBI single to right fielder Zyon Hamilton. Spearman finally ended the first inning roughly 51 minutes after the first pitch with another fly out to center field.
Spearman went on to pitch three innings, including a 1-2-3 third, after the first two pitchers combined for one out. He gave up seven runs on four hits, three walks and two strikeouts.
With him out of the game, Baptist went back to its earlier struggles, needing four other pitchers to get out of the inning. UAPB scored 15 runs on five hits and five walks with eight batters hit by pitches.
The final pitcher of the inning, Zykeem Lane, gave Baptist 2 1/3 scoreless innings to wrap up the game.
UAPB starting pitcher Nate Lee and reliever Spencer Watson, both left-handers, held the Buffaloes scoreless with two hits and eight strikeouts combined over four innings. Baptist finally found success at the plate against right-handed reliever Luke Rolland, scoring four runs against him in the fifth inning.
Third baseman Guara Ocasio, who finished 4 for 4, added an RBI single in the fifth and an RBI double in the seventh.