By MATT PIKE
The St. Joseph Mustangs avenged a loss to the Carroll Merchants on Sunday with a 12-4 victory on Wednesday in the middle of a three game road trip to Carroll, following two off days on Monday and Tuesday.
The Mustangs opened the scoring in the second inning on an RBI single by Eden Meyers, driving in Charles Stevens before the Merchants tied things up in the third inning with an RBI single of their own. In the fourth, St. Joseph started to pull away scoring four runs the first on an RBI double from Stevens, scoring Tyler Gundelfinger, before Meyers tripled driving in both Stevens and Carter Belton. A groundout by Missouri Western's Micah Kobuszewski brought Meyers home to make it 5-1 Mustangs at the end of four innings.
Three more runs scored for St. Joseph in the fifth inning as Gundelfinger tripled to drive in Atchison alum Boston Bruce and Lafayette alum Brayden Luikart. Gundelfinger scored when Stevens reached first base on an error to continue extending the lead. In the bottom half the Merchants got on the board again scoring on a wild pitch. Carroll scored their final run in the eighth inning with a two RBI single to make it 8-4 heading into the final inning.
In the ninth the Mustangs tacked on their final four runs, the first on an RBI single by Bruce scoring Missouri Western's Seth Winkler. Stevens two RBI single brought home both Stevens and Luikart and Lafayette alum Jayden Little drove in the final run with another RBI single, scoring Gundelfinger to make it 12-4.
At the plate, Stevens was 3-for-5 with a double and four RBI's. Meyers was 2-for-5 with a triple and three RBI's. Little was 3-for-5 with an RBI while Bruce was 1-for-3 with two walks and an RBI. On the mound, Central alum Owen Foster pitched five innings and gave up two runs on four hits while striking out seven.
The Mustangs are now 8-4 on the season, 6-3 in the MINK League, and will be in Carroll again tomorrow night at 6:30pm.
You can follow Matt on X @KfeqMatt.