DELAND, Fla. (May 23, 2025) – The University of North Alabama baseball team faced No. 2 Jacksonville in an elimination game at the 2025 ASUN Tournament and fell 3-2.

UNA faced Jacksonville for the opening game of the tournament, falling 5-1 on Tuesday. The Lions finished with the Dolphins on Friday, as JU won on a walk-off double.  

The Lions (24-31, 16-14 ASUN) were led by left-handed pitcher Reese Young, who threw a quality start in today's game with 6.0 innings pitched, which tied his season high. The freshman threw six strikeouts against the Dolphins, marking the second highest on the season.  

The Dolphins (30-25, 18-13 ASUN) walked-off the game with a double from ninth hole hitter Sammy Mummau. The ball carried and hit the left field wall padding to secure the final run to score.  

UNA was led by left fielder Nash Rippen on offense with a .500 day and a double. The team accumulated five hits with RJ Sherwood, Bryant Loving and Leighton Jenkins adding in. Loving had a triple in the top of the eighth for his second of the season.  

Jenkins added his RBI in the eighth for the first run of the day; Alex Wilson hit a sacrifice fly in the top of the ninth for the tying RBI. 

This was a near-perfect day for the Lions as they recorded no errors, no wild pitches and only pitched three walks for the Friday game. The two pitchers threw a combined six scoreless innings where four of those were hitless.  

After Young, Luke Davenport took the mound in the seventh inning and threw the final 2.2 innings and struck out a Dolphin. The righty threw 2.0 innings against the Dolphins on Tuesday with a strikeout.  

A rematch of the opening game for North Alabama comes nearly three days later to the exact time as the Lions and Dolphins got going at 9 a.m. central time on Tuesday.

The left-handed freshman Young got the start, and like the previous game between the two teams, seemingly was defensive to begin. 

Young caught two Dolphins swinging in the first inning to only allow one base runner. The Dolphins got their first hit of the afternoon in the bottom of the second but Young caught two more swinging to hold them scoreless.  

Sherwood gets the first hit of the day over the third baseman's head. Loving placed a beautiful bunt down to move him to second, but that was all for the third inning. 

The first run plated in the bottom of the third. Jaden Bastian was hit by a pitch and stole second at the next at-bat — another for the second best stolen base team in the ASUN. A groundout moved him to third before an RBI single to center scored him for the 1-0 lead. 

The game went scoreless until the bottom of the seventh as Young climbed to six strikeouts for the morning. 

However, the Lions had a great shot in the top of the inning. 

Delgado walked to open the top. Then Rippen roped a double that hit directly on the right field line to place two in scoring position. A fly out to short right center allowed Delgado to tag up. 

As he tagged from third, the throw came in. Delgado, seemingly did not expect first to cut off and hesitated half way down. After seeing the cut off, decided to go but was caught at home to end the inning.  

Davenport took the bump in the bottom of the seventh after a walk. A single up the middle scored one for the 2-0 lead. 

The top of the eighth gave juice, courtesy of Loving. He smashed a ball to left that hit off the top of the padding for a triple. Jenkins cleaned him up with the RBI single to cut it down, 2-1. 

Davenport held the Dolphins scoreless to move to the final inning. 

The ninth came, so did the theatrics.  

Delgado walked to open and Ethan Walker pinch ran for him. Rippen put a single through the right side and forced the Dolphins to swap pitchers after Walker made it to third.  

Lane walked to load the bases. Then Wilson hit a sacrifice fly out to right field for Walker to come flying in for the tying score, 2-2. Back-to-back flies ended the chances for UNA.  

The leadoff Dolphin, Conner Spelman, singled to center to open the bottom of the inning. A sac bunt moved him to second with an out at first.  

For the second out, Loving got the grounder, stared down the base runner and got the out at first. The final Dolphin hitter, Mummau, put one out to left to end the game, 3-2.  

This brings a close to the Lions' 2025 season with an overall record 24-31 and a conference record of 16-14. 

This season brought the first 20-plus win Division I season for UNA — the first with a winning conference record and over 15 conference wins. There were also seven series wins for the year with six coming in conference, both bests for a single season in the Division I era. 

The marked the first Division I era postseason berth and the first postseason win since 2017, which came during the Division II era.  

Of course the 24 wins are the most, but the journey to get there was the important piece. UNA played 34 straight games away from Florence, Ala. as the program was finishing the construction to Mike D. Lane Field at Bank Independent Stadium. Six of those games included SEC teams, all in the top-25 at the time of play with three teams top-10 and two being No. 1 in the country. 

This year's team was forged together through a combined 17 transfers and freshman as only three starting position players returned to the diamond.  

It concludes with Jonathan Lane, the four-year captain, finishing at the fourth all-time in career hits in school history with 212. 

Redshirt Freshman Petey Craska tied the Division I record for most doubles in a season with 18. Craska finished the season as a top-10 offensive power in the ASUN. 

Senior catcher Matthew Delgado broke the Division I record for most caught stealings this year with his 19 as he passed former Lion (and now Coach) Levi Jensen. Delgado finished second in the ASUN for that category this season.  

As the final pages of this chapter dwindle away, the loss will be the lasting impression in the record book. However, the 2025 season could eventually illustrate the awakening that was soon to come for a program budding with excitement.  

Pitchers of Record 
W – Chris Lotito (4-2) 
L –  Luke Davenport (3-4) 
S – N/A 

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