ABILENE, Texas – Hardin-Simmons' baseball team opened its weekend American Southwest Conference series against Howard Payne with a 13-7 win on Friday afternoon at Hunter Field.

Howard Payne scored three runs in the top of the second inning on a solo home run by Derek Gifford an RBI single by Joey Villareal and a sacrifice fly by Samuel Lampson.

HSU responded in the bottom of the second inning with a seven-run outburst. Freddy Nunez had an RBI single, Corey Ballew an RBI fielder's choice Nick Ellington a two-run single to centerfield. Keaton Hartman had a bases loaded walk, Nunez added another two-run single as HSU sent 12 batters to the plate in the inning.

In the third inning, HSU made it 9-3 with an RBI single by Ellington and scored another run on an error.

R.J. Roberts had a solo home run in the fifth and an RBI single and Rylee McGee added a two-run double to cut the HSU lead to 9-7 in the sixth. HSU scored a run in the seventh on a Luke Kirkbride grounder in the sixth a run on an error in the seventh and Jett Forrest walked with the bases loaded in the eight to set up the final score.

Ellington led the Cowboys with four hits and drove in three runs. HSU pounded out 17 hits and took advantage of six HPU errors. Roberts had three hits for HPU.

Kyle Purdes took the loss for HPU allowing nine runs (only two were earned) in three innings of work, Wyatt Tumlinson started for the Cowboys and allowed eight hits and four runs in four and one-third innings. Caleb Smith earned the win in relief with one and one-third inning of work. Jaydon Stephens worked two and one-third innings of scoreless relief and Caidon Livingston worked a scoreless ninth.

The Cowboys are 2-2 on the year and in league play and HPU fell to 1-3 overall and in ASC play. The teams will play a doubleheader on Saturday beginning at 1 p.m.

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