SLIPPERY ROCK, Pa. --- The Golden Eagles baseball team earned a series-opening doubleheader split on Friday afternoon, taking on Slippery Rock to kick off the four-game set. Clarion won the first game of the day 3-2 but fell in the nightcap 7-1.
 
Game 1: Clarion 3, Slippery Rock 2
RECAP: The Golden Eagles picked up the win in a low-scoring game, with Ryan Gallagher matching Nate Malak more or less zero for zero. Tyler Cerame put the Rock ahead 1-0 with a two-out RBI single in the bottom of the first inning, but Slippery Rock was kept from adding any more runs when Ethan McNally gunned down Michael Kitko at the plate from left field.
 
It stayed a 1-0 game until the top of the fifth inning, when Clarion broke through with three runs to take the lead. Caden Contant, Cole Yeager and Doran Mast strung together three straight singles to load the bases, and Tyler Boraski lifted a ball into foul territory for a sacrifice fly to tie the score at 1-1. Tyson Gill followed with a sharp single up the middle, plating Mast and Yeager to make it 3-1.
 
Cam Morris hit a solo home run in the bottom of the fifth inning to cut the deficit to 3-2, but Gallagher recovered to get out of the fifth without any further damage. After Gallagher allowed a two-out double to Cerame in the bottom of the sixth, Reilly Shafer entered and induced a groundout from Morris to keep the lead. Shafer finished the game off in the bottom of the seventh, forcing a 5-4-3 double play for his second save of the year.
 
Mast went 3-for-3 at the plate with a run scored, while Gill went 1-for-4 with two RBIs.
 
Game 2: Slippery Rock 7, Clarion 1
RECAP: This time it was the Golden Eagles who took the lead first and the Rock who responded, with Slippery Rock scoring seven unanswered runs starting in the fourth inning to earn the win.
 
The game was scoreless until the top of the third inning, when an error allowed Tyson Gill to score. He reached on a fielder's choice when he hit a grounder to second base and then stole second with two outs to reach scoring position. Ethan McNally's grounder to shortstop was misplayed, leading to Gill scoring from second to make it 1-0.
 
Morris tied the score in the bottom of the fourth inning with an RBI single, and Stone Powell put the Rock ahead with a solo home run to lead off the bottom of the sixth inning. Gage Gillott added a two-run double to the gap in left center, and Kitko hit a two-run single later in the frame to make it 7-1.
 
Randy Carlo and Yeager both finished with two hits apiece, with each going 2-for-3 at the plate.
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