Eastern extended its win streak to six games with a 11-1 win over Division 3 opponent Illinois Wesleyan University that ended in seven innings due to the run rule. 

“I just think they’re playing good baseball,” head coach Jason Anderson said. “We’re not super star led. There’s not one guy, we can do a lot of different things, and we just got to put them in position to have success.” 

Due to the nature of playing a lower division opponent, The Panthers (21-17, 9-5) got to use some players that don’t usually see much playing time. 

One who got to pinch hit was senior infielder Danny Infante who has only seen four at bats prior all season. 

With his opportunity, Infante hit a high fly ball that started to head out to straight-away centerfield but started slicing towards right-center.  

This caused the Illinois Wesleyan (20-12, 12-4) right fielder and centerfielder to collide with each other, and the ball bounced away from both of them, allowing Infante to come all the way around the bases for an inside-the-park three-run home run.  

This sparked a seven-run inning for the Panthers. 

“[Illinois Wesleyan} getting down toward the end of their bullpen, but they played good baseball, and it was game there until things kind of got out in the seventh inning,” Anderson said. “The fly ball in the outfield I think kind of took the wind out of the sails.” 

Going into the seventh, the Panthers led 4-1 thanks to two RBIs from sophomore catcher Colin Horneman, who got to make his fifth start of the season at catcher.  

He brought in the first run of the game with an RBI double in the second inning, then gave the Panthers a 2-1 lead in the fourth inning by walking with the bases loaded.  

The Panthers would score twice more later in the inning to take a 4-1 lead. 

In a scheduled bullpen day, where Anderson was trying to get the pitchers that hadn’t thrown much in recent games some work, Eastern used five pitchers. 

Senior left-hander Eli Cartwright entered the game with two outs in the third inning, getting out of a jam and then striking out the side in the next inning. He was credited with the win, improving to 3-0 on the season. 

Redshirt junior left-hander Kole Bradley then entered to pitch, and he faced only six batters, striking out one in a season-high two innings.  

“I think everybody had pretty good stuff today, but one person that sticks out to me is Kole Bradley,” Horneman said. “I think he had some adversity at the start and has really worked through that and showed it today that he could really do some good stuff.” 

After winning both their midweek games by at least 10 runs, the Panthers head into their Ohio Valley Conference weekend series against Southern Indiana. The first game starts at 6 p.m. on Friday in Evansville, Indiana. 

Bryce Parker can be reached at 581-2812 or at baparker2@eiu.edu.