GREENEVILLE, Tenn. – With postseason hopes hanging in the balance for both teams, senior left-hander Austin Mercado turned in arguably his best performance of the season to help lead the Anderson baseball team to a split of their final regular-season South Atlantic Conference doubleheader at Tusculum, Saturday afternoon at Newman Park.

Early mistakes in the opener led to an eventual 19-10 win by Tusculum, but the Trojans bounced back for a 5-2 victory in the nightcap.

Anderson improved to 24-24 overall on the season and claimed its first SAC Tournament appearance since 2019 with a 12-11 mark in league play. Tusculum wrapped up its regular season with a 25-22 overall record and an 11-13 conference mark.

INSIDE THE BOX SCORE
Game #1
Tusculum 19, Anderson 10
Kevin Sosa was 2-for-3 at the plate in the opener, with a double, a single and a pair of walks, while scoring three times. Kye Andress posted a double and a single and drove in two runs, while Jordan Montgomery added a single and a solo home run in the ninth. Carlos Hernandez notched a pair of singles and an RBI, with Gray Wells and Brayden Owens each adding a double and driving in two runs.

Grad student Nathan Sanders (4-4) absorbed the loss after allowing seven runs on five hits in 2.1 innings of work on the mound. He walked three batters and struck out two.

Game #2
Anderson 5, Tusculum 2
Owens was 2-for-2 in the nightcap, with a solo home run and a single, while Andress was 1-for-3, with a two-run homer and two runs scored. Anthony Pandolfi added two singles in three at-bats, with Hernandez notching a pair of singles in four trips to the plate. Montgomery was 2-for-3, with a pair of singles and a double.

After a rough first inning that saw Mercado allow a pair of runs on four hits, the resilient left-hander settled down and limited the Pioneers to just three singles over the final six innings. He didn't walk a batter and matched his season high with six strikeouts, while fanned the final Tusculum batter on a 3-2 pitch.

HOW IT HAPPENED
Game 1
Tusculum's offense proved to be too much for AU to overcome in the opener, as the Pioneers scored in every inning but the first and seventh frames, with the Pioneer's Christian Ortega opening the scoring by leading off the bottom of the second inning with his seventh home run of the season on a full count. Tusculum built an early 2-0 lead when Zach Brunet ripped a two-out double to left-center and scored on back-to-back miscues by the Trojans. Their lead grew to 4-0 following more two-out defensive mistakes by the Black and Gold.

The Trojans answered quickly by scoring three times before the Pioneers were able to record an out in the third inning. Back-to-back doubles by Sosa and Wells to open the inning got the Trojans on the board, while Andress added a single that moved wells to third base. Hernandez followed by beating out an infield single that also plated Wells with AU's second run and moved Andreas into scoring position. Senior Luke Poole then added the Trojans' third straight single to bring Andress home and pull AU within 4-3. Pioneer starting hurler Luke Absher then settled down and retired three straight AU hitters to end the top half of the third.

But Tusculum added to its advantage with a pair of one out home runs - the first a three-run shot off the bat of Murphy Flood, while Will Samuelson greeted reliever Cory Arthur with a homer, and the pioneers went ahead 10-3 with a pair of runs later in the inning.

AU added its' fifth run in the top of the fourth on Andress' sacrifice fly that plated freshman Braeden Harrison, who opened the frame with a walk. But the Trojans were unable to keep pace with Tusculum, which added four more runs in the fourth and a total of four additional runs in the fifth and sixth frames to push out to an 18-5 advantage after six full innings.

The Trojans finished by scoring five runs over the final two innings, while TU added a solo run in the bottom of the eighth.

Game 2
The Trojans threatened in the top of the first by getting runners at second and third with just one out but came up empty-handed. Meanwhile, Tusculum took advantage of three singles and a double to grab a quick 2-0 advantage after an inning.

Owens countered for the Trojans by clubbing his second home run of the season over the left-field fence with one out in the top of the second, and two batters later, Andress hammered a two-out, two-run homer beyond the left-field fence to give the Trojans a 3-2 advantage – and a lead they would not relinquish.

Two innings later, Brandon Gibbs led off the fourth with a double, moved to third on a sacrifice bunt by Owens and crossed the plate with AU's fourth run of the nightcap when Pandolfi singled to right.

The Trojans then loaded the bases with no outs in the top of the fifth and built a 5-2 lead when Poole bounced into a fielder's choice.

The three-run advantage proved to be more than enough for Mercado, whose seven victories on the season matches the seventh-highest single-season win total in program history, with the veteran shutting down the Pioneer offense over the last six innings.

STAT OF THE DAY
The two teams combined for 10 doubles and seven home runs on the afternoon.

NOTABLES
• JC LeGrand is riding a 14-game hitting streak and has reached base safely in 19 consecutive games.
• Tusculum leads the overall series with the Trojans, 27-14, with the first meeting occurring in 1998.
• The Pioneers have won four of the last seven matchups and eight of the last 13, but AU has won the three of the last four meetings.
• AU has won seven of its last nine outings, including six of its last seven conference contests.
• The Trojans won their fourth SAC series win of the season.
• AU's 12 league victories are the most since the 2018 squad also won 12 conference contests.
• The Trojans are bidding for the program's first winning season since the 2003 campaign and need to defeat Lander to achieve that mark.
• AU will be making its first postseason appearance since the 2019 campaign, when the Trojans were the No. 7 seed in the SAC Tournament
• Mercado's seven victories on the season matches the seventh-highest single-season win total in program history.

UP NEXT
The Trojans will wrap up the regular season by playing host to Lander on Tuesday, with first-pitch slated for 5 p.m. at Memorial Stadium.

AU will be looking for a sweep of the season series with the Bearcats after notching a come-from-behind, 9-5, win last February in Greenwood.