Baseball team falls to Daytona State College in series opener

The Eastern Florida State College baseball team lost the first game of a three-game series against Daytona State College Friday at Bruce Bochy Field on WEFS-TV.

The Titans lost a close Citrus Conference game 6-5 and will travel to Daytona State College for a doubleheader on Saturday beginning at noon.

Eastern Florida State College took the lead in the bottom of the second inning on back-to-back doubles by Luke Lambert and Laheim Bell. Up 1-0, starter Zaylen Perry ran into trouble in the third inning after setting down the first six hitters in order.

A walk started the inning and then after a flyout, three straight singles by Jaxon Junilla, Adam Parzych and Xavier Lopez led to two runs and a Falcons lead.

The lead would not last as Carlos Cordero reached on an error, went to second on a sacrifice bunt and stole third. Cordero would score on a groundout from Hector Mangual to tie the game. With two outs in the inning, Adrian Dominguez crushed a ball over the left-field fence for his third home run of the season.

After a single, Perry would strike out the next three hitters in the fourth inning and the Titans would tack on another run in the bottom of the fourth as Kevin Smith walked, stole second and scored on Jeff Davis' single.

Up 4-2, the Falcons would tie the game as Parzych and Connor O'Sullivan both scored. Bryce Carter relieved Perry and got out of the jam.

But walks caught up to Carter in the sixth and Daytona State College capitalized with two runs to take the 6-4 lead.

The Titans would get one run back in the seventh inning as Smith doubled, stole third and scored on an error to cut the lead to 6-5.

Eastern Florida State College would threaten in the ninth inning, but Caden Brown would get the final out with two outs.

The Titans are now 11-14 in the conference heading into Saturday's doubleheader.