Devin Brevig

The Braves battled late on Tuesday evening, but it still wasn’t enough as Bradley fell to The Fighting Illini of Illinois 4-2 in 10 innings. 

It was the first loss of the season against in-state rivals, bringing their record to 11-1 on the season

Despite still getting seven hits, Bradley struggled at the plate, striking out 16 times in 34 ABs. “That [was] a lack of focus, just not being ready to play,” head coach Elvis Dominguez said. “That’s not our ball club and we just didn’t come ready to play.” Dominguez said.

Andy Shadid led the way hitting, going 2-3 with both RBIs.

The game started relatively slow, with one run scored through the first 6 innings, coming from the Illini in the third. Coach Dominguez became fed up with his team’s effort and sat the team in the dugout and gave the team a little wake up call. “[Coach said] you guys better find some energy, because you’re getting your butts kicked in front of the home crowd right now,” Senior center-fielder Andy Shadid said. 

That seemed to be the spark the team needed, and it resonated especially with Andy Shadid. In the seventh inning, he sent his sixth homer of the year over the left field fence to tie the game up 1-1.

Neither team scored in the 8th, and in the 9th, Kellen Sarver of Illinois sent a moonshot to deep right field to take a 2-1 lead going into the bottom of the ninth. Dan Bolt drew a leadoff walk, followed by a past ball and a Connor O’Brien sac fly to deep center to put Bolt on third. 

Andy Shadid collected his second RBI of the day on another sac fly to deep center to tie the game at 2, and the game went to extras. 

Illinois got hot and scored two runs on three hits, and closed the fame out in the 10th to collect the victory and split the season series with the Braves. 

“We’ve been playing great baseball, and we played great baseball tonight, but we should’ve never been in that position in the ninth inning… Who wouldn’t be excited to play Illinois at home?” Dominguez said. “We didn’t come out excited and ready to play.” Dominguez said.

“This one was a tough one but we have to move past it and focus on the next one,” junior shortstop Luke Shadid said. “It’s important not to dwell on this one and learn from it,” Luke said. Shadid went 2-5 at the plate

Brendan Dougherty extended his on-base streak to 11 games as he went 2-4 at the plate. Dan Bolt and Jean-Francois Garon saw their streaks come to an end. Bolt’s hitting streak was brought to a halt at 14 games. Garon lost his streak of reaching base safely at 16 games, striking out 4 times in 4 appearances at the plate. 

Junior right-hander Theron Denlinger took the L on the mound, delivering 2.0 innings and striking out two and allowing three earned runs. The Braves staff collectively gave up 4 earned runs and had seven strikeouts. Sophomore Brooks Gosswein, Seniors Allan Beer and Brian Schrimmer, Freshman Paxton Thompson, and Denlinger all got looks on the mound. 

Bradley hopes to get back to its winning ways, taking a 3-game losing streak into a weekend series to Springfield, MO to take on conference foe Missouri State. 

Both teams are 4-5 in conference play. Missouri State (13-27) is looking to get back to winning as well as they have dropped the last two and 8 of the last 10.

“We just [have to] figure it out, that’s just the bottom line,” Coach Dominguez said.

“It’s important to take it one pitch at a time,” Andy Shadid said. “We have to bring more energy, throw strikes, have timely hitting and  come out and just play Bradley baseball,” Andy said.

The first game of the series begins Friday afternoon at 2pm.