MILLIGAN COLLEGE, Tenn. (April 9, 2016) â€" Austin Perry and Codie Campbell turned in a couple of solid starts, but the Milligan College baseball team fell twice to Union College, 4-3 and 4-0, Saturday afternoon in a series-opening Appalachian Athletic Conference doubleheader on Anglin Field.
 
Milligan (17-19, 8-9 AAC) and Union (21-18, 9-8 AAC) will finish the series on Sunday with the series finale scheduled for 1 p.m.
 
Saturday's doubleheader saw Perry go six innings while allowing only three earned runs (four total) on 10 hits and two walks while striking out four. Campbell also went six innings and gave up six hits, four runs and six walks while striking out eight. Each suffered the loss, however, as the Buffs were quiet offensively, scoring in only one inning in the doubleheader.
 
Perry was most efficient in the later innings, having been tagged for a couple of runs in each of the first two innings before settling down to limit the visiting Bulldogs to four hits over his last four innings of work. Conversely, Campbell was most efficient in the early innings, facing only four over the minimum through the first four innings. It wasn't until the fifth, after being hit in the shoulder by a comebacker lined up the middle, that Campbell gave up any runs.
 
Jarrett Ramsey, Jacob Littleton and Dustin Cole all put in work out of the bullpen, and the trio combined to allow only two base runners, both via walk, in the two leftover innings of defense.
 
Milligan's big scoring inning in game one came in the fifth inning when Andrew Copas and Nelson Schneider reached base to lead things off. The Buffs were down 4-0 at that point, but a Hunter Suggs groundout and a Shane Salley double quickly cut the score in half, and a Bryan Soto triple made it a one-run game and put the tying run on third. The inning ended on a strikeout five pitches later.
 
Suggs looked to start a two-out rally in the bottom of the seventh but was left stranded at second, and a similar story would unfold in game two as the Buffs loaded the bases in the final inning but could not push anyone across.
 
Justin Pearson started the would-be rally in game two with a single to left field, and two groundouts, a single by Copas and a walk by Tanner Peer later, Milligan had the tying run at the plate. This inning ended on a ground ball to third.
 
Copas ended the day with a pair of hits, one in game one and the other part of the seventh-inning rally in game two. Soto also had two hits, both coming in the first game.
 
After Milligan and Union finish the series Sunday at 1 p.m., the Buffs will be on the road over the next two weeks and return home for the final three games of the regular season when they will face No. 8 Tennessee Wesleyan College on April 30-May 1.