JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (April 12, 2025) – The ETSU baseball team clinched a series victory against Western Carolina on Saturday with a 3-1 win over the Catamounts at Thomas Stadium. With Saturday's win, the Bucs improve to 24-9 overall and 5-3 in SoCon action.
 
For the second time in eight conference games, the Buccaneer pitching staff held the opposing lineup to one run. Jace Hyde tossed the first five innings for the Blue and Gold allowing one run on four hits to go with four strikeouts. Sophomore Brady Frederick came in to relieve Hyde and finished the game. Frederick threw the final four innings and surrendered just two hits and struck out four to notch his first career save in preserving ETSU's 3-1 win.
 
Offensively, the Bucs totaled seven hits in the contest. Two of the seven came off the bat of Joey Little for his fifth multi-hit game of the season. The lone extra base hit on Saturday for ETSU was a solo home run by Axel Melendez. Cooper Torres and Tristan Curless also tallied hits and drove in ETSU's other two runs on the day.  
 
Neither offense got much going in the early innings on Saturday. The Bucs would break through with a two-out rally in the fifth. Blake Jacklin sparked things with a single. Grant Gallagher worked a walk to give the Bucs two runners on base with two away. Torres and Curless then delivered back-to-back RBI singles to break the scoreless deadlock and give the Bucs a 2-0 lead.
 
After allowing a single to the first batter of the game, Hyde settled in and did not allow another hit until the sixth. Searching for any kind of offense, the Catamounts used a pair of bunt singles plus another single to load the bases with nobody out. With WCU threatening with a big inning, the Bucs turned it over to Frederick. Frederick did a great job getting out of the bases-loaded jam as he forced a double play and struck out the final batter of the inning to escape with just one run allowed to make the score 2-1 Bucs.  
 
Melendez gave the Bucs a little extra breathing room with a leadoff solo home run in the sixth, his fifth of the season. Frederick took the ball the rest of the way to close out the win for ETSU. WCU got one runner on base in each of the final three innings but all three were left aboard.
 
The Bucs and Catamounts will conclude their three-game series on Sunday. First pitch for Sunday's series finale is set for 1 p.m. from Thomas Stadium.

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