May 21, 2005
MACON, Ga. - Dee Brown established a new single-season home run record at UCF with his 18th home run of the season but it was not enough as Mercer (28-26, 12-18) squeaked out an 8-7 victory over visiting UCF Saturday afternoon at Claude Smith Field. With a win, UCF (40-16, 19-11) would have secured the No. 2 seed in next week's Atlantic Sun Tournament. The Golden Knights now must hope for Georgia State to win today's third game of the series vs. Florida Atlantic to hand UCF the No. 2 seed.
Mercer's Ty Megahee singled through the left side in the ninth with two runners on and one out to hand the Bears the series victory and the 8-7 win.
Andrew Einert hit his second solo home run of the series to give to score the game's first run in the second.
In the third, Daniel Hurst connected on a two-run home run to extend the Bears' lead to 3-0.
UCF continued the trend of home runs as Marshall Bernhard drilled a two-run shot to left to bring the Golden Knights to within one at 3-2.
Mercer scored for the third straight inning with two runs in the fourth to extend the lead to 5-2.
UCF responded with its second home run of the game as Brown hit a two-run shot to right-center to close the gap to 5-4.
Brown's monster weekend continued in the sixth as he lined a two-run double to the gap in left center to give UCF its first lead of the game, 6-5.
Mercer responded in the home half of the sixth with back-to-back home runs by Hurst and Josh Thompson to give the Bears the lead back at 7-6.
The slugfest continued in the seventh as UCF scored for the fourth straight inning as Ryan Bono launched a solo home run to right to even the score again, this time at seven.
The game remained deadlocked at seven until the ninth. UCF used Brian Brooks to start the inning and the left-hander got a groundout before allowing a single. After a call to the bullpen, UCF sent in Dominic Petracca. Petracca allowed two soft singles through the left side, including Megahee's game-winner to secure the 8-7 Mercer victory.
Game Notes: Dee Brown hit his 18th home run of the season to establish a new single-season home run record at UCF ... Brown was tied with Dustin Brisson (1999) for the single-season mark at 17 ... Brown's four RBI pushed his season total to 69, tied for sixth in single-season history at UCF ... Matt Ray stole two bases to bring his season total to 31 ... the 31 steals moved Ray into a tie for eighth place in single-season history at UCF with Jose Sato (1986) ... Ryan Bono was hit by a pitch for the 17th time this season, a new single-season record at UCF.