Aloy Performs Cleanup in Arkansas' Midweek Rout Against Missouri State

Arkansas pounced on the Missouri State Bears early with a powerful early swing en route to beating the Bears 12-7.

"It was an opportunity to play some other guys tonight and just did it," coach Dave Van Horn said. "Seemed like a lot of guys contributed and it was a good win for us."

The Razorbacks led off the game with three consecutive singles which set the table for a Wehiwa Aloy 406-foot grand slam, his 11th of the season, to put the Hogs up 4-0.

The offense didn't stop there, after scoring one in the second, back-to-back walks set up the Razorbacks in the third. Arkansas hung another four spot on the Bears. Jack Wagner, appearing in just his 17th game this year, singled to left to drive home the first run. Hudson White drove him home with a double into the right-center field gap. The inning was capped by a two-run error off the bat of Peyton Stovall to extend the lead to 9-0.

Gage Wood, making his first start at Arkansas, gave Van Horn three clean innings, facing the minimum after White erased the only baserunner trying to steal second. However, Cooper Dossett struggled, allowing five of the six batters he faced to reach allowing the Bears to get on the board. A second run scored on a bases-loaded hit by pitch before Christian Foutch came in in relief and allowed a two-run single for Missouri State to cap their four-run inning of their own.

"It was just good to see him go out there and throw the ball over the plate and make them swing the bat," Van Horn said. "He mixed pretty well."

Ryder Helfrick got a run back in the fourth with a double down the left field line and came around to score on a Jayson Jones RBI single for his 17th run scored in just his 17th start to restore a more comfortable 11-4 lead.

The Bears got three runs back on a three-run shot off the bat of Taeg Gollert, but the tying run never came to the plate. Sprague-Lott added an extra run on his sixth homer of the year in the bottom of the eighth.

Arkansas will finish its 2024 midweek slate against the Bears Wednesday 4 p.m. with a chance to win all 12 midweek games. The game will be streamed on SEC Network+.

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