THE LEAD
Despite a complete game effort from freshman right-hander, Dalton Higgins, No. 9 Dallas Baptist bowed out of the Missouri Valley Conference after falling 3-1 to Bradley on Friday at Eck Stadium in Wichita, Kansas.  In just the second start of his career, Higgins surrendered only three earned runs and struck out a season-high six batters, as Higgins became the first DBU pitcher to throw a nine inning complete game since Taylor Massey went nine innings in a win over UT-Arlington in the Waco Regional on June 1, 2012.  With the loss, Dallas Baptist (43-13) falls out of the MVC Tournament and now turns their attention to Monday when the field of 64 teams is revealed for the NCAA Tournament.
 
Higgins ran into trouble in the top of the first as Bradley (35-18) lead-off man, Chris Godinez, doubled to open the game and eventually came around to score on a Tyler Leffler ground out to short.  Trailing 1-0 into the bottom of the second, DBU's Tagg Duce laced double to left field and would touch home two batters later, as.David Martinelli delivered a sacrifice fly to center field.
 
Tied at one apiece into the fourth, Bradley's Spencer Gaa put the Braves on top when he came around all the way from second on a wild pitch by Higgins.  Facing Paul Solka, a swing and a miss resulted in a strikeout, but with the pitch getting away from Patriot catcher, Daniel Salters, Gaa turned the corner at third as Salters' made his throw to first to retire the batter.  With home plate vacated, Gaa beat Chane Lynch's throw to Salters, who was racing back to the plate, giving Bradley a 2-1 lead.
 
The Braves would add one more run in the fifth, as a Chris Godinez double allowed Tyler Leffler to score all the way from first.  From there, Higgins shut down the Braves the rest of the way, retiring the final 10 batters he faced.
 
Despite Higgins' efforts, DBU could not muster any offense off of Bradley starter, Cameron Roegner.  The crafty lefty worked a career-high eight innings and allowed just one run, while not allowing a runner to reach second base after the fourth inning. 

Matt Dennis came on in the ninth to close out the Patriots in order, ending DBU's hopes of repeating as conference tournament champions and sending Bradley to tomorrow's championship game.
 
DBU HEAD COACH, DAN HEEFNER ON DALTON HIGGINS' PERFORMANCE
"Dalton really pitched out there tonight.  He's come on strong in the second half of the season and tonight he showed great poise and pitchability.  He was able to command all three pitches for a strike against their lineup and that was huge for us to have him throw like this tonight as we head into a regional."
 
DBU HEAD COACH, DAN HEEFNER ON DBU'S POSITION HEADING INTO THE POSTSEASON
"We should be at home next week.  Our guys deserve that.  They've had an outstanding season with a great record and we've done it against a tough schedule, so we should be hosting and that's a great thing for our program."
 
INSIDE THE NUMBERS
101 – Number of pitches thrown by Dalton Higgins.
1 – An error in the fifth inning was the only error in four games this week by DBU at the MVC Tournament.
8 – Trooper Reynolds totaled eight hits in DBU's four games, going 8-for-15 with a .533 batting average.
 
UP NEXT FOR THE PATRIOTS
DBU will find out where they will play and the three other teams in their regional on Monday, when the field of 64 is released on the NCAA Tournament Selection Show on ESPNU at 11:00 am.