Denver—The Metropolitan State University of Denver baseball team lost its season opener 2-0 to Emporia State on Friday afternoon.  The Roadrunners move to 0-1 and the Hornets improve to 3-1. 

Sophomore Julian Garcia (Fort Collins, Colo./Fossil Ridge H.S.) got the start for the Roadrunners and took the loss after pitching into the eighth inning.  Garcia only gave up one run on four hits after seven and a third innings.  He allowed only three walks and tallied an impressive nine strikeouts.

Senior Jeff Levett (Parker, Colo./Chaparral H.S.) led off the first inning with a walk.  Junior Andrew Paust (Parker, Colo./Ponderosa H.S.), who started as clean-up hitter for the Roadrunners, smacked a double down to the left-field corner in his first at-bat of the season to advance Levett to third.  Unfortunately, the Roadrunners were unable to bring him home and the score remained 0-0.

In the fifth inning MSU Denver had another promising chance when senior second-baseman Nick Comito (Lakewood, Colo./Mullen H.S.) hit a double, and then advanced to third on a stolen base.  He was also left stranded 90 feet from home.

Senior Cameron Stroup (Arvada, Colo./Arvada West H.S.) replaced Garcia on the mound in the eighth, securing the last two outs to get out of the inning.  Comito had a beautiful defensive pickup in the infield to secure the final out of the inning.

The Roadrunners went into the ninth inning down 1-0 with right-handed reliever sophomore Cale O'Donnell (Fort Collins, Colo./Rocky Mountain H.S.) looking to close out the game.  The Hornets managed to get two hits and a run off of O'Donnell to extend their lead to 2-0, which ended up being the final score of the game.

MSU Denver will play the second game of their three-game series against Emporia at the Regency Athletic Complex Saturday at noon.