Heroics save Hoosiers

The baseball team rallied from an 8-1 deficit Tuesday night to escape from Dayton, Ohio with a non-conference victory over Wright State. The win avenges IU's March 26 loss to the Raiders that denied coach Bob Morgan his 1,000th career victory at home.\nWSU blew the game open in the bottom of the second with the score tied 1-1. The Raider offense lit IU freshman starter Troy Ragle up for seven runs on five hits, a walk and an error. \nMorgan stuck with his youngsters, though, sending sophomore Brian Lortz to the mound in relief of Ragle with IU trailing 8-2 in the third. Lortz responded with four strong innings of one run, two hit baseball.\nThe Hoosier rally began to gain steam in the top of the sixth when IU plated five runs on a home run from junior catcher Cody Wargo and a pair of RBI triples from seniors Brad DeStefano and Vasili Spanos.\nWith IU trailing 9-8 in the top of the eighth, the Raiders decided to intentionally walk Spanos with runners on second and third and one out. That brought junior Kevin Mahar to the plate. The Hoosier first baseman made the Raiders pay as he ripped off a three RBI double to put the Hoosiers up 11-9. After his five-RBI output last night, Mahar now places second on the team behind Spanos, who has 30, with 22 RBIs.\nFreshman Chris Hynes threw two scoreless innings of late relief to earn the win and senior closer Ryan Smith shut the Raiders out in the ninth to earn his fifth save of the year.\n "It was a great come-from-behind win," Morgan said in a statement. "We did a good job to come all the way back from being down 8-1. Brian Lortz did a good job of coming in and shutting them down. We got some good, key hits and swung the bat really well. Overall, I'm proud of the way we battled back for the win."\nIU will stays on the road this weekend against conference foe Ohio State.