Kingsville completes sweep of Hounds

The struggles continued on Sunday for the Eastern New Mexico University baseball team.

Second baseman Ben Villafuerte's tie-breaking, two-run homer kicked off a five-run fifth inning and Texas A&M-Kingsville went on to complete a four-game Lone Star Conference series sweep of the Greyhounds with an 11-5 victory at Greyhound Field.

Kingsville (31-15, 14-10 LSC) remained in a three-way tie for second with Angelo State and Abilene Christian while the Hounds (19-25, 6-18) dropped their ninth in a row and 15th in the last 17 games.

With the scored tied 3-3, Ryan Boydstun (1-3) — the starter in an 18-16, extra-inning loss in the second game of Saturday's doubleheader — relieved starter Ben Monticello to begin the fifth and was unable to retire a hitter.

Joe Tallerine led off with an infield hit and advanced to third on Boydstun's throwing error before Villafuerte belted his third homer of the season to left field on a 1-0 pitch.

Another run scored on a second throwing error by Boydstun, and Ryan Guedry added a two-run single.

ENMU jumped on Matt Rhodes (5-3) with two out in the first on singles by Peter Creamer and Josh Cunningham and a two-run double to right-center by Matt Spradlin. The Javelinas tied it in the second on James Black's two-run single, and they went in front in the third on an RBI single by Taylor Taska.

ENMU pulled even in the fourth on a run-scoring single through the right side by catcher Jacob Rogers. The Hounds closed to 8-5 in the sixth on RBI singles by Colton Sims and Brooke Brooks, but Rhodes shut them out the rest of the way, going the distance despite throwing 121 pitches and getting touched up for 13 hits.

Pinch-runner Julian Duran scored on Travis Laird's single for Kingsville in the seventh, then stayed in the game and banged a two-run double in the eighth.

Nine players hit safely for the Hounds, including Brooks, Cunningham, Spradlin and third baseman Andres Enriquez with two hits apiece.

ENMU closes out the season with a four-game home LSC series against rival West Texas A&M, beginning with a 6 p.m. single contest on Friday.