May 28, 2004

Charleston, SC - The Citadel's Ken Egleton wasn't perfect Thursday night against Davidson, but he was good enough.

Egleton threw a complete game, giving up six hits, and the Bulldogs pounded out 11 hits in a 10-2 trouncing of Davidson in the second round of the Southern Conference Baseball Tournament in front of a crowd of 2,628 at Riley Park.

The Bulldogs (35-25) will face Western Carolina, which rallied to beat Elon 7-6, today at 4:30 p.m. The Wildcats will face the College of Charleston, a 5-4 winner over UNC Greensboro, today at 1 p.m. in an elimination game.

Egleton dominated the Wildcats, especially in the middle innings as the sophomore retired 15 straight batters at one point.

"I thought I had a good live fastball tonight," said Egleton, who improved to 8-2 on the season. "I just tried to work off of that. I threw in a breaking ball every now and then and found the strike zone." Egleton threw 119 pitches in all, and he struck out eight batters.

"Ken Egleton pitched extremely well for us tonight," Jordan said.

Jordan said the third-seeded Bulldogs won't take anything for granted today against the eighth-seeded Catamounts.

"Western Carolina has seven guys in their lineup that played in a final of a (NCAA) regional last year," Jordan said. "(Western Carolina) got off to a tough start, but they're a very good baseball team. We've got our work cut out for us."

The Citadel jumped to a 7-0 lead in the second inning, sending a total of 11 batters to the plate off Davidson starter Andy Carter.

Citadel first baseman Chip Cannon set the tone for the inning, leading off with a double that bounced off the right field wall. The Bulldogs quickly loaded the bases with no outs and got an RBI single from Andy Phillips, a two-run single from Will Coker and another run-scoring single from Josh Stackley.

"I thought Chip really sparked us at the plate with that double in the second inning," Jordan said. "I thought our guys swung the bats well."

It would be all the runs the Bulldogs would need.

"We were trying to get some momentum early in the game and get some guys on base," said Cannon, who finished with two hits. "I think that second inning set the tone for us. I think that gave us a lot of confidence."

The Bulldogs pushed the lead to 10-0 with three runs in the third. Mark Egleton, Phillips and Matt Matulia singled to load the bases with one out.

Matt Covington singled to right to score Egleton and Phillips to chase Carter from the game. Chris Ard added another run-scoring single in the inning for the Bulldogs.

After retiring 15 straight batters, the Wildcats finally figured out Egleton in the sixth. Ronnie Shore doubled with two outs down the left field line and scored on Eli Benefield's double to left-center to make it a 10-1 game.

Davidson got a run in the eighth inning for the final margin of victory.