Rain forces changes to Southeast Regional schedule
The early Friday morning thunderstorm that moved through Columbus dumped enough rain on the field at Burger King Stadium to force a change in the schedule for the NCAA Division II Southeast Regional.
Instead of three games on Friday, the schedule now calls for one.
Mount Olive and Catawba, which was set to start at 10:30 a.m., will now be played at 7 p.m. Friday. Both teams lost on Thursday, so this is an elimination game.
Organizers will try to get four games in Saturday, starting with Columbus State and USC Aiken at 10 a.m. This will be Columbus State’s first game in the regional, USC Aiken beat Tusculum in Game 1 on Thursday.
Lander and Belmont Abbey, which both won Thursday, will play at 1:30 p.m.
The Mount Olive/Catawba winner will play the will play the Columbus State/Aiken loser at 5 p.m. Saturday.
Tusculum, which lost to USC Aiken on Thursday, will face the Lander/Belmont Abbey loser at 8:30 p.m.
Late Thursday
Lander 6, Mount Olive 4
Lander, the No. 2 seed, scored four runs in the bottom of the seventh and held on to down Mount Olive 6-4 on Thusrday night.
The game, which started at 3 p.m., didn’t end until after 10 p.m. due to two lightning delays that lasted about four hours.
Matt White hit a 2-run homer for the Bearcats in the bottom of the third for a 2-0 lead.
Mount Olive got one of those runs back when Joe Koehler hit a homer in the fifth to lead off.
John Mangum led off with a homer to start Lander’s four-run seventh. Zach Daly doubled in the other three runs.
Stephen Wallace hit a 3-run homer in the eighth for Mount Olive.
Belmont Abbey 6, Catawba 5
With the previous game delayed twice by lightning, this game didn’t start until 10:52 p.m. on Thursday. The two teams played 12 innings and 3:51 to finish at 2:43 a.m.
Belmont Abbey scored a run in the ninth to force extra innings and scored the winner in the bottom of the 12th with one out.
Lorenzo Wright scored the tying run in the ninth, then drove in the winner in the 12th.
Nick Beinlich, Kayden Krause and Thomas Yoder hit homers for Belmont Abbey. Dylan Richardson hit one for Catawba.
Kevin Price: 706-320-4493, @lesports
NCAA Southeast Regional
all games at Burger King Stadium
Seeding: 1. Columbus State. 2. Lander. 3. Belmont Abbey. 4. USC Aiken. 5. Tusculum. 6. Catawba. 7. Mount Olive.
Thursday
Game 1 — USC Aiken 2, Tusculum 1
Game 2 — Lander 6, Mount Olive 4
Game 3 — Belmont Abbey 6, Catawba 5, 12 innings
Friday
Game 4 — Mount Olive vs. Catawba, 7 p.m.
Saturday
Game 5 — Columbus State vs. USC Aiken, 10 a.m.
Game 6 — Lander and Belmont Abbey, 1:30 p.m.
Game 7 — Game 4 winner vs. Game 5 loser, 5 p.m.
Game 8 — Game 6 loser vs. Tusculum, 8:30 p.m.
Sunday
Game 9 — Game 5 winner vs. Game 6 winner, TBA
Game 10 — Game 7 winner vs. Game 8 winner, TBA
Game 11 — Game 10 winner vs. Game 9 loser, TBA
Monday
Game 12 — Game 9 winner vs. Game 11 winner, noon
Game 13 — if necessary
This story was originally published May 20, 2016 at 2:42 PM with the headline "Rain forces changes to Southeast Regional schedule."