MAGNOLIA, Ark. – The runs came early and the runs came often and when the smoke settled #7/9 Southern Arkansas had placed the finishing touches on the program's sixth Great American Conference regular season title on Friday from Walker Stadium at Goodheart Field as the Muleriders dismantled Southern Nazarene with a collective 30 runs across 14 innings of action to take both ends of the doubleheader and lock up the top seed in the upcoming league tournament.
 
The Muleriders' (34-9, 25-4 GAC) doubleheader sweep of the Crimson Storm earned sixth-year head coach Justin Pettigrew's squad some hardware that can be added to league regular season titles won in 2012, 2013, 2015, 2017 and 2021. SAU will look for the series sweep on Saturday in a Senior Day tilt scheduled for high noon.
 
About those early runs. In the opener, Southern Arkansas plated five in the first inning and added one more in the second, while the second game witnessed the Muleriders combine for eight runs over the first three innings of play to stake its respective starters to unnecessary comfortable leads considering how each dealt on Friday night.
 
Junior Wyatt Marr improved to 7-0 after allowing just three hits and a single run over six innings of work. He worked around four walks and fanned a season-high eight batters. Marr stranded the bases loaded in the second and then proceeded to toss a clean third and fourth inning. Junior Maddux Solomon faced the minimum in the seventh to close out the 14-1 victory.
 
Freshman Jeremy Adorno added to his nation's best win total as his twelfth victory of the season saw the righthander log his sixth complete game with 11 strikeouts in seven innings that saw SNU manage just five base hits and a walk. Adorno, who became just the fifth Mulerider arm to top the century mark in strikeouts in a single season, now has 112 punchouts in 2022: the fourth-most in program history.
 
The Muleriders combined for 25 hits across the two games with 11 coming in the opener. Sophomore Chris Sutton led the way with three hits, including a solo home run in the second inning. Eight of the nine players in the hitting order recorded a hit in the opener with sophomore Jackson Duke adding two hits; one of which was a bases-clearing double with two outs in the opening frame that stamped the five-run first.
 
Junior Conner Allen cranked a two-run shot in the fourth and junior Ty Manning blasted a three-run shot in the fifth as the four extra-base hits by the Muleriders in game one plated nine of the game's 14 runs.
 
In the second game, SAU accounted for six extra-base hits of the 14 recorded. Five players recorded two hits each. Duke homered in the second inning, and Allen hit his second of the day in the third inning to plate a pair. The Muleriders took advantage of three errors and used four hits as part of an eight-run sixth inning to put the game out of reach and claim the series.