Alabama Secures The Series Opener In Tuscaloosa

On Friday afternoon, the No. 22 Alabama Crimson Tide remained undefeated at home after their 8-4 series-opening win over the Wright State Raiders.

Following the win in game one of three, coach Brad Bohannon said, "It was really exciting to see a lot of hard contact up and down the lineup, I thought we were really good offensively. Not as efficient as we need to be, but I was really glad to see a lot of production out of the bottom (of the lineup)."

The winning pitcher of record for Alabama is junior LHP Tyler Ras after going 7.0 innings with five strikeouts, allowing only one hit and one run - both stemming from the single home run given up in the third inning.

Freshman LHP Grayson Hitt came in for relief, but only faced four batters before being struck - for the second time this week - by a line drive, straight up the middle. The Tennessee native didn't seem too shaken up by the incident, but couldn't find the strike zone once he was given the time to return.

Left-handed senior Brock Guffey had to come in on short notice after the injury to Hitt and managed to get the Tide out of the jam left by the freshman. After the rough top half of the 7th inning for Alabama, Guffey looked far calmer and managed to cruise for the rest of the evening. Guffey finished the night with five strikeouts in just 2.2 innings of work.

No. 5 Tyler Ras - Crimson Tide Photos / UA Athletics

On the offensive side, however, it looked like there were no mistakes to be made. Just a few pitches into the home side of the first inning, sophomore Alabama native Peyton Wilson hit his third home run of the season, a 402-foot bomb to right-center field, to give the tide the early lead. The inning after Ras gave up his only run of the outing, sophomore Zane Denton and junior TJ Reeves made up for the mishap by launching back-to-back home runs themselves. Freshman Caden Rose also made some important strides in the box as he managed to go 2-for-3 with 3 RBI.

The next game in Alabama's three-game home series with the Wright State Raiders comes tomorrow, Feb. 26 at 1:00 pm as apart of a double-header.

For more content from J.R. and all the talented interns at Tide 100.9, make sure to tune-in for Tide Tonight - Monday 7:00-8:00 pm, as well as, Wednesday and Friday 6:00-7:00 pm. You can hear all of our radio content on the new Tide 100.9 app!