Baseball falls to Vermont State Castleton, 5-3

SEGUIN, Texas -- Texas Lutheran Baseball dropped the series opener to Vermont State Castleton by a score of 5-3 at Katt-Isbel Field Friday night in a first-time matchup between the two teams.

Aric Vasquez (San Antonio/Brandeis), Asher Bonnell (Round Rock/Stony Point), and Tyler Post (San Antonio/Johnson) all drove in runs, but the Bulldogs were limited to three runs despite ten hits.

Castleton scored two runs in the first on two hits to take an early 2-0 lead and the Spartans would add a third run in the third inning.

Following a double from R.J. Carrillo (Alice/Alice), an infield single by Aric Vasquez followed by a Castleton throwing error would cross the Bulldogs first run of the game in the fourth.

The Spartans would tack on two more runs in the top of the sixth to extend their lead to 5-1. After back-to-back singles and a sacrifice bunt to lead off the bottom of the inning, Asher Bonnell would drive in Carrillo with a sacrifice fly before an RBI double from Tyler Post would score Mason Goudeau (Liberty/Liberty) to shrink the Spartan lead to 5-3 through six.

Texas Lutheran would strand two of their 11 runners left on base in the final three innings as the Spartans held on to their 5-3 lead for their first win of the season.

Nolan McInvale (Poth/Poth) struck out three batters in 3.1 scoreless innings of work out of the bullpen.

The Bulldogs and Spartans will square off in a doubleheader on Saturday at 12 & 3 PM at Katt-Isbel Field. All games this weekend will be streamed on TLU's YouTube Channel, TLU+. All streaming and live stats links can be found on tlubulldogs.com.

For more information on Texas Lutheran baseball and all TLU athletics, you can find updates on tlubulldogs.com and all official TLU social media channels (@tluathletics and @TLU_Baseball on X (Twitter), @tlubulldogs on Facebook, and @tlu_athletics on Instagram and TikTok).