MACON, Ga. (April 18, 2025) – The ETSU baseball team made some history on Friday night as it slugged a single-game program record eight home runs in an 11-0 run-rule victory at Mercer. With Friday's win, the Buccaneers are now 26-11 overall and 7-4 in SoCon play.
 
The Bucs had 12 hits in the win and eight of them were home runs. All eight long balls were solo shots. Cody Miller, Lenny Montesano and Cooper Torres all hit two homers a piece. Jamie Palmese and Tristan Curless also notched homers in the historic night for the Buccaneer offense.
 
To go along with ETSU's impressive slugging performance, the Bucs also got one of its best starts of the season from sophomore Jace Hyde. Hyde held the Mercer offense, which hit three long balls in the first game of the series on Thursday, to two baserunners (a double, a walk) in seven shutout innings. Hyde, who struck out six on Friday, improved his record to 6-0 on the season with the standout performance against Mercer.

After being held to a season-low one run in the series opener, the Bucs wasted little time in jumping out to an early lead in game two of the series. Blake Jacklin got things started with a one-out single. A walk from Grant Gallagher led into an RBI double by Torres to give ETSU a 1-0 lead. Both Gallagher and Torres would score a batter later as Curless smacked a two-run double in the gap to grow the Bucs' lead to three, 3-0.
 
ETSU would add to its lead in the second with solo homers from Montesano and Miller to push the lead to 5-0. Torres hit his first long ball of the night in the third to make it 6-0 Bucs. The Blue and Gold then began the fourth inning with three straight home runs from Montesano, Palmese and Miller. The Bears seemed to settle things down a bit with back-to-back outs but then Torres and Curless launched pitches over the outfield wall for the team's seventh and eighth home runs of the night to make the lead 11, 11-0.
 
The 11 runs of support were more than enough for Hyde. Hyde seemed to get stronger the longer he pitched as he retired the final 10 batters of the night. Hyde was also efficient finishing with 83 pitches (57 strikes) in the seven-inning, one-hit shutout.
 
The rubber game of the series between the Bucs and Bears will be played tomorrow afternoon. If ETSU wins that game, it'll be the first series win for the Bucs in Macon since 2009. First pitch for the series finale is set for 1 p.m.

For more information on Buccaneer baseball, visit ETSUBucs.com and click on the baseball tab.