Alabama does damage with 2 outs

BY CHRIS COCOLES

Posted on Saturday, May 3, 2008

URL: http://www.wholehogsports.com/adg/224590/

FAYETTEVILLE — Kent Matthes was happy to face the pressure of trying to drive in runners with two outs.

In fact, Alabama’s junior right fielder was the grand marshal for a parade of clutch at-bats in Friday’s 11-7 victory over Arkansas at Baum Stadium.

Matthes tied a career high with five RBI, each coming with two outs. He drove in one run with a single in the third, hit a three-run home run in the fourth and contributed a run-scoring single in a three-run eighth to help Alabama withstand a late Razorbacks rally.

“Fortunately my best at-bats came with runners in scoring position,” said Matthes, who went 3 for 4 and is batting. 317 with 8 home runs and 41 RBI. “That’s when you want to have your best at-bats.”

He was complemented by teammates Josh Rutledge, Ross Wilson and Alex Avila, all of whom came through with runscoring hits in two-out situations. The Crimson Tide finished 9 for 20 with 9 runs scored and 8 RBI in those situations.

Alabama Coach Jim Wells couldn’t recall a better two-out performance by his hitters.

“That’s good,” said Wells, whose team moved into a firstplace tie in the SEC West with Ole Miss. “We’re starting to do a better job of that, because usually when we got down, we were done. We didn’t have anybody to come in, so we’re showing some signs.”

Just when it looked like the Crimson Tide’s string of timely hitting was coming to an end Friday night, Alabama struck again. Razorbacks reliever Mike Bolsinger retired nine of the first 10 batters he faced. But in a one-run game and with two out in the eighth, Brandon May’s single extended the inning and Avila and Matthes followed with RBI hits to finish it off.

“[Bolsinger ] was shutting us down and we’d lost our aggressiveness,” Wells said. “One run was not comfortable there. That was huge, Avila getting that hit, and we managed to get a couple more.”

“We gave them a six-run [fourth ] inning and a three-run [eighth ] inning,” Arkansas Coach Dave Van Horn said. “That hurt.”

Whether Alabama’s pesky hitting carries over into today’s second game of the series is uncertain. But at worst the Tide set the tone for challenging Arkansas’ pitchers the rest of the weekend.

“We didn’t need to sit around and not score in those [opportunities ],” said Rutledge, who extended his hitting streak to 24 games Friday. “They just couldn’t stop our offense tonight.

“ We need to keep plugging away and score runs.”