May 10, 2001
The Purdue baseball team lost to Evansville today, 20-13, in its final regular season non-conference game of the season. The Boilermakers stand at 29-21, heading into their final weekend series against Iowa this coming weekend.
Daniel Underwood led off the bottom of the first with his fourth home run of the season. Purdue led 1-0 before Evansville got four runs in the second and five runs in the third. Purdue came back with three runs in its half of the third. Mike Duursma doubled to center field with one out in the third. After Underwood walked, Dave Blomberg hit his 15th double of the season, driving in both runners. David Harrell added a single to score Blomberg, as Purdue closed the gap to 9-4.
The Boilermakers added three more runs in the fourth. Kris Luce led off with a double, his 12th of the year. John Gusich singled through the left side to advance Luce to third. Duursma added his second extra-base hit in as many at-bats, a triple to center field, scoring Luce and Gusich. Underwood singled to score Duursma, getting on base for the third consecutive time, as the Boilermakers narrowed the Evansville lead to 9-7.
Evansville added three in the top of the fifth to take a 12-7 lead, but Purdue came back to tie the game after six innings of play. They scored one run in the bottom of the fifth when Luce singled to score Nick McIntyre, who hit his 16th double of the season to get on base. They added four runs in the bottom of the sixth to tie the game at 12-12. Duursma walked to lead off the inning, then advanced to second on a wild pitch. Underwood tripled to center field to drive in Duursma, his fourth consecutive time on base. He then scored on a wild pitch, to make the score 12-10. Blomberg was walked, then stole his team-leading 18th base of the season. McIntyre flied out to center, advancing Blomberg over to third. He scored on a Harrell ground out to third. To close the inning, Nate Sickler drilled his team-leading seventh home run of the season to even the score.
Evansville added seven runs in the top of the seventh and one more run in the top of the ninth. Purdue scored one more run in the bottom of the eighth as Underwood scored his fourth run of the day on a McIntyre ground out.
Purdue resumes play Saturday with a 3 p.m. game against Iowa at Lambert Field. The series continues Sunday with a doubleheader beginning at 1 p.m., and the regular season finale at 1 p.m. on Monday.