The Ball State University baseball team had four errors, five hits and allowed eight runs in a loss to the University of Louisville, its final game before Mid-American Conference games begin.
Ball State had won five of its last six games before the 8-2 loss Tuesday.
"Our main weakness is consistency," coach Greg Beals said. "That's the big thing with a young team. We are really battling with being consistent."
The Cardinals had their best offensive performance of the season against Bowling Green State University Sunday, with a season high 11 runs and 18 hits prior to the two-run and five-hit performance against Louisville.
"Mostly we just weren't hitting the pitches we should hit," senior Eric Earnhart said.
Earnhart missed the Cardinals' first 13 games due to a violation of team policy. Last year Earnhart played in 56 of the team's 60 games and started in every game he played.
"I really missed being out there with the guys I had worked so hard with during the offseason," Earnhart said. "It's a great feeling just to be playing."
Despite Earnhart's return to the Cardinal infield, the team has still collected a high number of errors. Beals said the errors aren't coming from the infield players.
"We're making silly errors," Beals said. "Two of [the four] errors were out in the outfield. Too many of our mistakes are mental."
Even with the errors, Ball State attempted a comeback down 4-0 in the top of the 7th inning. With the bases loaded, Zach Dygert singled to the right side allowing Earnhart and Kory Benbow to score, cutting the lead in half; however, Ball State gave up two runs in the bottom of the 7th inning, ending the comeback.
"That certainly hurt," Beals said. "We went out and walked the first two guys and those two guys ended up scoring. We had started to get into the game. It broke the game back into their favor."
Louisville scored two more times in the bottom of the 8th inning before getting Ball State to go down in order in the 9th inning to seal the victory.
Brad Piatt started for Ball State for the second time this season. He pitched three innings, allowing four hits and striking out two. Louisville scored twice with Piatt on the mound, but due to an error, only one will count against Piatt's earned run average.
Ball State's five hits were collected by five batters and five base runners were left on base by the Cardinals.
Beals said the team still has a lot of room to improve, despite already improving from the team's 1-7 start to the season. He said he would give the team a C+ grade based on their performance so far this season due to the mental errors and lack of consistency; however, he said, the talent on the team excites him and he believes the team can do as well as last year's squad.
Ball State has today and tomorrow off before starting the MAC season with a three-game home series against the University of Akron.
Brenden Stines, Tyler Pritchard and Ryan DeGeeter will continue to be the weekend starting pitchers for Ball State, Beals said.
"They'll get a good bullpen workout during the week and be ready to go against Akron," Beals said.
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