The Lions took two of three against the UA-Huntsville Chargers over the weekend in a conference series that saw the Lions’ bats come alive.

UNA opened Saturday’s doubleheader with an 8-6 win behind Chad Boughner on the mound. Boughner went 8 1/3 innings in the opener to get the win, despite giving up 12 hits. The win brought Boughner’s career win tally to 28.

The Lions went down early to the Chargers in game one, falling behind 3-0 in the second inning. UNA’s bats woke up slowly, getting a run back in the bottom of the second and another in the third.

UNA took the lead during a huge four-run fourth inning with all the runs coming with two outs. Jake Ward’s triple brought in Josh Carpenter to start the lead-taking rally. Big hits from Dylan Boston and Andrew Almon polished off an important inning for the Lions. Another RBI by Boston in the sixth and a run scored on an UAH error in the eighth put UNA up 8-3 before having to fend off a seventh inning charge by UAH. The three runs plated by the Chargers included a two-run homerun before Boughner was able to get himself out of trouble.

Third baseman Almon said the team knew it was going to be an important weekend.

“Coming in, we knew we were going to have our hands full,” Almon said. “UAH was leading the conference in hitting. I think they were batting around .350. But we had been working hard on our hitting, and the weekend before against Delta State and this past weekend against UAH, it came together for us.”

The second game Saturday turned into a pitcher’s duel. A far cry from the opener, game two saw Michael Watkins pitch a 1-0 shutout. Matthew Tittle was brought home on a Bradley Noland double in the second inning to set up a tense seven-inning battle from the mounds.

Watkins not only had some of his best pitching working for him, but he also combined with first baseman Josh Cyr and Almon on a couple of big defensive plays to get himself out of a jam. Right fielder Josh Doyle also made a sliding catch in the sixth inning to preserve the one-run lead.

“We expected the second game to be kind of like the first with both teams swinging the bats well,” Almon said. “Watkins had his best stuff on Saturday, and we all played well on defense to keep it going.”

After scoring the first run early in the game, Almon said it began to get a bit tenser as the innings wore on.

“There are always some nerves in a game like that,” he said. “We just wanted to play good defense and try and help our pitcher out.”

The series finale did not pan out the way the Lions would have liked as they dropped game three 10-8 after having an 8-1 lead in the

sixth inning. The Lions gave up nine runs on 14 hits to the visitors over the last four innings, during which both dugouts made their dissatisfaction with the

umpires known.

“Over the course of the whole weekend I would say the calls weren’t very consistent,” Almon said. “It’s frustrating when he calls it a ball at one at bat and then calls the same pitch strike three at the next at bat.

“We know we can’t let up, and losing a game like that is tough for us, but we have another huge weekend series coming up down at West Florida.”

The two wins over the weekend bring the Lions up to 5-4 in the GSC and 13-10 overall.

UNA faces West Florida away this weekend. West Florida is 6-3 in conference play and currently third behind UAH and Delta State.