SAN ANTONIO – Angelo State built a big lead with nine runs through five innings before tacking on an insurance run in the ninth and held on to earn a 10-9 non-conference win over No. 13-ranked St. Mary's which scored four runs in the bottom of the ninth on Tuesday at Dickson Stadium to sweep the regular-season series over the Rattlers.  

The Rams (27-12, 15-11 LSC) improved to 12-1 in non-conference play with the win over the Rattlers (28-9) and are now 9-8 away from San Angelo going into a three-game Lone Star Conference set at West Texas A&M (26-14, 16-10 LSC) this weekend in their final regular-season road games. ASU led 10-5 going into the bottom of the ninth before St. Mary's scored four runs and had runners at first and third before Steve Naemark coaxed a groundout to Brett David at first base to end the game.

ASU, which is 14-7 all-time against St. Mary's, has now swept the regular-season series over the Rattlers four times in program history with previous season sweeps coming in 2009, 2008 and 2007. 

"We all know that Tuesday night games can get crazy, but it was good that we were able to hang on and get the win," ASU head coach Kevin Brooks said. "I really liked the way we came out ready to play and jumped on them early. I would have liked to see us close out the game a little cleaner, but anytime you can come down here to San Antonio and get a win over St. Mary's you'll take it any way that it comes. It was a good win for us and hopefully it will help us down the road getting a season sweep over them."

Matt Shannon (3-1) earned the win for the Rams after striking out five and limiting the Rattlers to two hits and one earned run in five innings of work in his third start and 11th appearance of the season. A red-shirt freshman from Pleasanton which is in the greater-San Antonio area, Shannon improved to 2-0 against the Rattlers after also earning the win back on March 31 at Foster Field where he also went five innings. Naemark earned the save by getting the final two outs of the game in his first relief appearance. Naemark has now made 12 appearance and now has a save on his resume which also includes seven wins.

"Whenever I can get the ball I'm going to embrace the opportunity," Naemark said. "It gets intense real quick when you come into the game in relief and I feed off that."

ASU finished the game with 15 hits which included J.C. Snyder going 3-for-4 for his 15th multi-hit game of the season and David Goggin going 3-for-5 with a season-high three RBI. Paxton DeLaGarza finished the game 2-for-5 with a home run and three RBI, while Cody Semler also had three RBI after going 2-for-4 with a double and single. The Rams have now scored in double-digits in back-to-back game and nine times this season and have had double-digit hit totals in 15 games. Their 15 hits on Tuesday were four shy of the single-season record of 19 hits which they had in wins over Texas A&M International and Tarleton State.

DeLaGarza hit his fifth home run of the season in the first inning after Sam Kohler had reached by being hit by a pitch. It was DeLaGarza's 27th RBI of the season and his 53rd hit. The Rams added their third run of the game in the second inning with Cody Semler hitting a single to left-center field to score Cameron Massengill and then added two more in the third with David Goggin hitting a two-out single to right field that scored Brett David and J.C. Snyder to make it 5-0.

ASU would break the game open with DeLaGarza adding another run with an RBI single in the fourth and then a three-run fifth which was highlighted by a two-run double by Semler to left-center field and Goggin pulling a single down the right-field line to score Snyder to make it 9-1 through five innings.
Graylon Brown, who had not allowed an earned run in 13 appearances, saw the Rattlers score four runs in the ninth before Naemark entered to secure the save. Kellen Rholl and Joe Hauser also pitched for the Rams.

The Rams and Buffs will begin their series at 7 p.m. on Friday before playing a 1 p.m. doubleheader (7/9 innings) on Saturday at Wilder Park. The two teams split their four-game series in mid-March at Foster Field. WT will be coming off a 6-5 win over Lubbock Christian on Tuesday after it took two of three from Eastern New Mexico last weekend in conference play.

ASU enters this weekend with 396 wins in program history and has matched its win total for all of 2014. The Rams are now only three wins from their ninth 30-win season in program history and four wins from the 400th in program history and in the head coaching career of Brooks who established the program in 2005.