AVON, Ohio – The No. 6 seed Toledo baseball team dropped its first game of the MAC Baseball Championship on Wednesday afternoon as they were unable to overcome a strong pitching performance from No. 3 seed Ball State in a 5-1 defeat at Crushers Stadium.
 
Toledo will now face an elimination game on Thursday, May 23 at 10:00 a.m. back at Crushers Stadium. The Rockets will play against the loser of No. 4 seed Miami and No. 5 seed Kent State, who will play today at 6:00 p.m. Thursday's matchup will again be streamed on ESPN+.
 
The Rockets (25-31) only managed one hit on the day as the Cardinals (33-21-1) took a 2-1 lead through six and put the game away with a three-run seventh. BSU starting pitcher Merritt Beeker pitched a complete game.
 
Senior Grant Umberger (5-5) battled through 5.0 innings, giving up two runs on 11 hits and striking out five. He stranded 10 baserunners and once again set a career high in pitches with 106. Freshman Jacob Tabor and senior Kyle Music worked the final 3.0 innings, with Music pitching 2.0 innings without allowing a run or a hit and striking out three.
 
Freshman JP Wagner drove in Toledo's only run of the afternoon, plating junior Trey Wright in the fifth inning.
 
HOW IT HAPPENED

• Two two-out RBI singles gave Ball State a 2-0 lead after one inning.
• UT manufactured a run in the top of the fifth with back-to-back walks, a sacrifice bunt and an RBI groundout by JP Wagner.
• Ball State hit a solo home run to take a 3-1 lead in the seventh. The Cardinals then brought home another run on an RBI single and added one more on a balk to push their lead to 5-1.