BOWLING GREEN, Ohio – The Western Michigan baseball team had seven different players launch a total of 10 home runs in a doubleheader split on Saturday at Bowling Green. The Broncos were edged out by the Falcons, 17-16, in the first game of the day, then bounced back to take the finale, 18-10.
 
FINAL SCORE (G1): Bowling Green 17, Western Michigan 16 (F/8)
LOCATION: Steller Field (Bowling Green, Ohio)
RECORDS: Western Michigan (12-23, 9-12 MAC) | Bowling Green (11-24, 8-16 MAC)
W: Owen Recker (1-5) | L: Dane Armbrustmacher (2-3)
 
FINAL SCORE (G2): Western Michigan 18, Bowling Green 10 (F/7)
LOCATION: Steller Field (Bowling Green, Ohio)
RECORDS: Western Michigan (13-23, 10-12 MAC) | Bowling Green (11-25, 8-17 MAC)
W: Joe Shapiro (2-6) | L: Connar Penrod (1-3)
 
Three different Broncos recorded multi-homer games on Saturday, with Will Morrison and Cade Sullivan doing so in the opener, and Dylan Nevar blasting a pair in game two. WMU's seven long balls in game one was a season high.
 
Connor Charping paced the Western Michigan offense with seven hits for the day, including four in game two. Nevar went 6-for-9 in the two games, scored a team-high seven times, with a career-high four coming in the finale, and drove in four runs. Morrison brought in seven runs, including a career-best four in game one, while Sullivan collected six RBIs for the day and equaled his career-best with five in the opener.
 
Bowling Green raced out to an early lead in the opener, plating five runs in the first. WMU got its first homer of the day in the second, a two-run shot by Sullivan, then got to within 6-4 in the third after Charping and Nevar each brought in a run.
 
Trailing 7-4 in the fourth, Morrison closed the gap to one with a two-run blast, and Josh Swinehart then gave Western Michigan a 9-7 edge with a three-run shot in the fifth.
 
The Broncos found themselves trailing 10-9 in the sixth, and responded by taking an 11-10 advantage after Justin McIntyre and Charping belted back-to-back home runs, the second time this season WMU has had back-to-back round-trippers. BGSU evened the score in the bottom half at 11-11.
 
Morrison broke the deadlock with his second two-run homer of the afternoon in the seventh, only to see BGSU tie it up in the home half and send the contest into the eighth.
 
Sullivan drilled a three-run shot to give Western Michigan a three-run cushion, 16-13, in the top of the eighth, but once again the Falcons rallied, tallying four in the bottom of the inning to claim the victory.
 
In game two, a Sullivan sacrifice fly broke the ice, and Nevar followed with a two-run homer to give WMU a 3-0 first-inning edge. The Falcons then countered with two in their half of the first frame.
 
The Broncos erupted for six runs in the third. Swinehart and Charping plated a run apiece, with Morrison and Jimmy Allen each collecting a two-run single to push Western Michigan's lead to 9-2.
 
BGSU pulled one back in the bottom of the third, but Nevar led off the fourth with his second long ball of the game, and Greg Budig added an RBI single to extend WMU's edge to 11-3. Budig reached all five times he came to the plate in the finale, including a career-high three hits and a career-high tying four RBIs.
 
Western Michigan's advantage was briefly trimmed to 11-6, but the Broncos answered with a three-run fifth to push the margin back to eight, 14-6.
 
Leading 14-9 in the seventh, WMU added four, as Budig blasted a three-run shot, his first round-tripper of the season, and Charping notched the final Bronco run of the day with a single.
 
The Broncos and Falcons close out their four-game series on Sunday afternoon. First pitch is scheduled for 1:05 pm.