Print story | Email story

Updated 6:12 AM on Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Aggies beat rain, Cougars

On stormy night, A&M gets 8-3 win over Houston

By RICHARD CROOME
Eagle Staff Writer

Luke Anders and Blake Stouffer continued to push their batting averages toward .400, and Scott Migl shut down the Houston Cougars for four innings after the rain had passed to lead Texas A&M to an 8-3 victory on Tuesday at Olsen Field.

Enlarge photo

Buy this photo Eagle Photo/Butch Ireland Texas A&M's Parker Dalton scores as Houston catcher Luis Flores can't hold onto the ball as he applies the tag in the Aggies' 8-3 win on Tuesday at Olsen Field.

Stouffer was 3 for 5 and is batting .392, while Anders was 3 for 4 to raise his average to .381. A&M had three two-out, run-scoring singles - one each by Stouffer, Anders and Ben Feltner - as they remained perfect at 8-0 in Tuesday games.

"We've come out ready to play. We haven't had letdowns after weekends, and that's the thing I'm most proud of on this team," A&M baseball Rob Childress said. "I've been on a lot of teams that have Tuesday letdowns because of the emotion of the weekend before or the emotion of looking forward to the coming weekend, and we haven't done that."

A&M won its first Big 12 road series since 2004 by taking two of three at Missouri last weekend. The fourth-place Aggies host second-place Oklahoma State this weekend.

A&M beat Houston for the second time this season, moving to 31-8. The Cougars dropped to 19-17.

The Aggies scored in each of the first four innings and were leading 7-2 when the rain delayed the game for 65 minutes.

Migl, a freshman, replaced starter Jason Meyer after the delay and pitched four innings of shutout ball for his fifth victory in six decisions.

With one out in the first inning, Feltner chopped a ball that UH starter Donnie Joseph (0-1) bobbled before throwing into the visitors' bullpen. Feltner, with his speed, had no trouble getting to third on the play.

Stouffer plated Feltner with sharply-hit opposite field single to right. Kyle Colligan singled to left and then the two pulled off a double-steal.

Anders went the opposite way to bring home Stouffer for the second run.

Houston got one back in the second. Luis Flores, who had two long homers last season at Olsen Field, took a Jason Meyer pitch well beyond the left-field fence.

TEXAS A&M 8, HOUSTON 3 RECORDS: Texas A&M (31-8), Houston (19-17) WP: Scott Migl (5-1) LP: Donnie Joseph (0-1) NEXT: Oklahoma State at Texas A&M, 6:30 p.m. Friday

Feltner knocked in the Aggies' second-inning run with a single to right. Parker Dalton, who had a two-out single, scored on the play. Chris Joseph's throw beat Dalton to the plate, but Flores was unable to hold onto the ball when he applied the tag.

In the third, Anders had a single to right. Craig Stinson walked and Spencer Jackson knocked in Anders with a shot that bounded over third baseman Dustin Kingsbury.

After a passed ball and a wild pitch scored Stinson, Brodie Greene walked to set up Dalton's double to the wall in left-center which scored Stinson and chased Joseph.

Houston brought in reliever Shea Hancock, and the rain came with him.

"[After the] rain delay, I thought we lost a little momentum," Childress said. "We're one hit away from making it a stress-free rest of the game, and they came in and got a double play, probably one of the weirdest ones I've ever seen."

When play resumed with one out and Dalton on second and Green at third, Brandon Hicks hit a chopper to Kingsbury. He threw home to get Greene, who retreated to third, where Dalton was. Dalton was called out, and Greene left the bag and was tagged for the third out.

The threat of rain kept about half the announced crowd of 3,056 away, and by the time the delay was over there were only about 300 fans remaining. They made themselves heard, though, when the Aggies extended their lead to 7-2 on Anders' fourth-inning line drive up the middle to plate Stouffer, who had singled and stolen second.

The Aggies added a run in the seventh. Brodie Greene was hit by a pitch, stole second but was thrown out going to third on Dalton's grounder to shortstop. Dalton stole second and scored on Stouffer's third hit of the game. Stouffer had two RBI and two runs.