It may have taken nearly four hours but Saint Louis’ reign over Eastern is finally over.

When Kevin Carkeek’s seeing-eye single found the right field grass at Coaches Stadium to score Mark Chagnon breaking a ninth inning 15-15 tie, the ballgame and Saint Louis’ eight game winning streak over the Panthers were both over.

Carkeek’s game winner capped off a back and forth contest that saw Saint Louis open up an eight-run lead after 2 1/2 innings only to have the Panthers come back with nine runs of their own in the bottom of the third.

After Eastern and Saint Louis traded runs the teams were knotted at 12 heading into the bottom of the eighth. Freshman Ryan Campbell led off the eighth with a solid single to the right and after pinch hitter Paul Dean reached base on a fielder’s choice ground out the stage was set for designated hitter Pete Stone. The sophomore sent Saint Louis reliever Kurt Struckhoff’s offering over the left-center wall to give Eastern their biggest lead of the day at 15-12.

However, the victory would have to wait as Eastern-right hander Chris Vaculik ran into trouble in the ninth. With two runners on and two outs, Vaculik fired a knee-high fast to Saint Louis first baseman Drew Eder who stunned the Panthers and the fans at Coaches Stadium with a mammoth home run to center field tying the game at 15.

But the Panthers were only momentarily dazed. Chagnon led off the ninth with a surprise bunt that hugged the third base line allowing him to reach first without a play. Second baseman Chris Uhle followed with a sacrifice bunt moving Chagnon to second. Campbell stepped up to the plate next and roped a single past shortstop Pat Steinhoff, but the ball was hit and Panthers third base coach Mitch Rosenthal held Chagnon at the bag. The move paid off and set the stage for Carkeek’s heroics and a Panther win, their 11th in the last 14 ball games.

Although Eastern’s head coach Jimmy Schmitz could have done without so many twists and turns he was still pleased with the Panthers comeback.

“It was nice to come back from an 8-0 deficit,” Schmitz said. “I use funny words like ‘passion’ and ‘caring’ and after we’re down by eight it’s just boom, boom, boom and it seemed like we were going to do it. I’m really happy with the comeback in terms of getting back into the game and obviously in the end they put their better guys in and we put our better players and we got great hits by Pete Stone and Kevin Carkeek.”

As the case with any high scoring game both teams pitchers struggled. Erik Huber started the game for the Panthers, but went only 1 1/3 innings surrendering seven runs (five earned) on six hits while striking out two. Jason Pinnell fared little better as he entered the ballgame in the fifth and gave up a pair of runs in one inning of work. Vaculik (3-1) picked up the win, but was hit hard allowing four earned runs in 2 1/3 innings.

“I’m kind of a little disappointed with the pitching,” Schmitz said. “We need Huber to get us those three or four innings, because we can’t be stuck using three or four pitchers.”

The Panthers continued their solid play defensively with only two errors and both came on throwing miscues from catchers Jason Cobb and Joe Hernandez. Campbell looked extremely sharp in the field making two nice running plays and Kyle Haines made a diving stop on a ball to keep it in the infield.

“We played well defensively and the errors didn’t come back to hurt us,” Schmitz said. “Campbell made a great play on the back hand and he made another were he had to come up and get the ball. Haines made a crucial play over the middle and while our team fielding percentage isn’t all that good, but we’ve really played good defense and haven’t given away games.”

The 16-15 win avenges a 19-10 loss the Panthers suffered against Saint Louis on March 30 and, according to Campbell, revenge was sweet for the Panthers.

“Definitely, it’s always nice to come back and beat a team the second time around,” Campbell said.