A sacrifice pop-fly ball in the bottom of the ninth inning gave the Panthers the final run they needed to win the final home game of the season.

The Panthers won the game against the Bradley Braves by 4-3.

The Panthers led the game by two runs from the bottom of the fourth inning until the Bradley Braves tied it up in the top of the eighth inning.

The Panthers drew first blood in the bottom of the third inning on a base hit from Ryan Dineen, a junior infielder/pitcher, driving in Nathan Sopena, a junior infielder.

On Monday, Dineen was named the Ohio Valley Conference’s Player of the Week.

Austin Peay’s Jordan Hankins also received the honor.

The Braves answered back with a run in the fourth inning.

In the second half of the fourth inning, Ben Thoma, a red-shirt senior outfielder, hit a single and David Ciaglia, also a red-shirt senior outfielder, came up to bat next and hit it out of the park, making the score 3-1.

The Braves came back in the eighth inning to tie up the score on two separate hits with Ciaglia hitting a sacrifice fly ball later in the inning allowing T.J. McManus, a red-shirt senior infielder, to score the winning run.

Cameron Berra, a sophomore utility player, said he did well on defense and was upbeat going into this week’s series against Jacksonville State in Alabama.

“It feels good to get that win going into this week at ‘Jack State,’” Berra said.

The Panthers are 25-25 while the Jacksonville State Gamecocks are 24-27.

Jim Schmitz, Eastern’s head baseball coach, said he was glad to have had a variety of pitchers to choose from.

“I think the big part was that we got in a couple of pitchers we were really wanting to get in, who we are going to need at the end of the year,” he said.

Schmitz also said he was pleased with the team’s performance, especially defense and pitching, and he had no complaints.

“But pitching overall just shut them down the entire day; and with the new guys, it’s really nice to have some depth going into the end of the season, and they actually did a great job,” Schmitz said.

The Panthers will go up against Gamecocks in a three-day game starting today.

The first game will take place at 6:30 p.m. today in Jacksonville, Ala.

Marcus Smith can be reached at 581- 2812 or masmith6@eiu.edu.