BEAMOUNT, Texas – Complementary baseball helped Northwestern State take control of the Southland Conference through the first seven weekends of conference play.
That type of play did not show up in Sunday's Southland doubleheader at Lamar, as the Demons dropped both ends, 4-3 and 3-1, in a series sweep by the Cardinals at Vincent-Beck Stadium.
"I wish I had some magical answer as to where all of these offensive woes are coming from, but the reality is that I'm really just not sure," third-year head coach
Chris Bertrand said. "We've go to take a little bit more pride in our way of thinking through the at-bats, and we've got to take a little bit more pride with two strikes. The only way we really know how to try to fix it is just to get back to work."
The Demons (23-17, 14-10) suffered their first conference sweep since Week 1 of the 2025 Southland season at Southeastern Louisiana.
The Northwestern offense scored four runs in the sweep, scoring in two of the 33 innings where the Demons had an at-bat.
Their lone crooked number of the weekend came on one swing when
Joe Siervo erased a 1-0 deficit with a three-run home run in the sixth inning of Sunday's first game – a contest that eventually went 15 innings.
Siervo's fourth home run of the season put the Demons up 3-1 before Lamar (22-18, 14-7) answered with a Lane Sparks solo home run in the sixth and Kevin Duran's second run-scoring fielder's choice of the game in the eighth.
The Demon offense could not solve Lamar freshman left-hander Jarret Williams (five-plus innings, eight strikeouts) and senior right-hander Travis Lutz (seven innings, seven strikeouts) as they limited Northwestern to Siervo's home run in the first 12 innings.
Northwestern had its best extra-inning shot in the 15
th inning when JT Simonelli doubled to start the frame but was stranded at third base.
Tab Tracy worked a leadoff walk from
Lucas Harrington (2-1) to start the 15
th before eventually scoring on a wild pitch.
In the nightcap,
Trent Hillen (2-3) gave the Demons a quality start, allowing three earned runs in 6 1-3 innings. Hillen left the game with a 2-0 deficit that increased to three when Beau Durbin laced an RBI double.
The Demons answered in the eighth with their best threat of game two as
Mason Wray led off with an opposite-field single and came around to score on
Brooks Leonard's one-out RBI single.
Northwestern eventually loaded the bases with two outs before Ethan Oceguera, who earned the game one win with two scoreless innings of relief, escaped the jam with a groundout to short.
"It's not good baseball execution at the moment," Bertrand said. "It's definitely not complementary in the way we try to be. On Friday night, we got the pitching we needed, and we lacked the offense and defense. Today, I thought we had the pitching and the defense, and we really lacked the offensive part of it. We played 33 innings this weekend, and we scored in two of them. We allowed our opponent to post 31 zeroes on the weekend. It's got to be a little bit better than that if we're expecting different results."
The Demons return to action Tuesday when they host ULM. First pitch is set for 6 p.m. at Brown-Stroud Field.
Lamar 4-3, Northwestern State 3-1
Game 1 (15 innings)
NSU 000 003 000 000 000 – 3 9 0
LU 000 101 010 000 001 – 4 12 0
W – Ethan Oceguera (4-1). L –
Lucas Harrington (2-1). 2B – NSU, JT Simonelli. LU, Jake Wagoner, Beau Durbin, Tab Tracy. HR – NSU,
Joe Siervo (4). LU, Lane Sparks (3). Highlights: Simonelli 2-4, 2B;
Zach White 2-4. LU, Tab Tracy 2-6, 2B; Durbin 2-7, 2B; Hector Rodriguez 2-6; AJ Taylor 2-6; Wagoner 2-5, 2B.
Game 2
NSU 000 000 010 – 1 4 0
LU 010 010 10x – 3 8 0
W – Julius Carpio (2-2). L –
Trent Hillen (2-3). S – Blayne Fritcher (1). 2B – NSU,
Ethan Menard. LU, Beau Durbin. Highlights: LU, Tab Tracy 2-4; AJ Taylor 2-4.
Records: Northwestern State 23-17, 14-10; Lamar 22-18, 14-7.
