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WILSON – The 23rd-ranked UNC Pembroke baseball team plated three runs in both the seventh and eighth innings and held off a late comeback attempt by Barton to put the finishing touches on a successful road campaign with a 10-8 win over the Bulldogs on Tuesday afternoon at Nixon Field.

Ben Schmucker matched a career high with four hits and drove in three runs for the Braves (32-15) who put the finishing touches on a 14-9 clip on the road – the sixth time in the last eight years that the Black & Gold has registered a winning record away from Pembroke. Jordan Edgerton (3-for-5, 3 RBI) and Daniel Fraga (1-for-4) both hit home runs for the visitors as well.

Three different players registered multi-hit outings for Barton (14-30) including Calvin Hawke who drove in a run and scored twice on a 2-for-4 day at the plate.

Southpaw Jordan DeLoatch (6-0) struck out seven and scattered seven hits and five earned runs over 6-2/3 innings of work to stay perfect on the season for the Braves. Zach Breen (5-2), the third of seven pitchers on the day for the Bulldogs, did not make it out of the seventh and took the loss after allowing three earned runs on four hits and a free pass.

Max Gagnon reached base via a costly fielding error to start the fourth, and Fraga made the Bulldogs pay moments later with a homer to right field that broke the scoreless deadlock. A costly wild pitch allowed Edgerton to cross the plate later in the inning, while a two-out RBI double by Ben Schmucker padded the lead out to 4-0.

Barton would answer with a four-run fourth inning to tie things up, including a two-run single by Matthew Berry.  The hosts took a 5-4 lead in the fifth on a one-out solo homer by Dillon Rudio.

Edgerton knotted the score back up on a one-out RBI single through the left side in the seventh, and Schmucker gave the Braves the lead for good three batters later when he plated a pair of runs on a single to centerfield. The visitors would add three insurance runs in the eighth, scoring on a wild pitch as well as a two-run homer by Edgerton.

Barton put together its second comeback effort of the contest in the late innings, scoring one run on a one-out single in the eighth, and then climbing to within a pair of scores with two more in the ninth. J.P. Padgett would slam the door on the rally, however, by striking out Andrew Webster and inducing a game-ending fly out from the bat of Avery Harper.

The Braves will close out the regular season portion of their 2014 schedule this weekend when they suit up to host GRU Augusta (17-29, 9-18 PBC) in a key Peach Belt Conference series at Sammy Cox Field. The squads will open up the weekend with a 7 p.m. tilt on Friday evening, and continue the set with a 3 p.m. first pitch on Saturday and a 1 p.m. contest on Sunday.

Promotions are set to take place during or before all three legs of the series. Patrons attending Friday evening's game will receive Trading Cards Set #3, while also having the opportunity to participate in a game of Baseball Bingo. Saturday's "Family Day" tilt will be preceded by a special Senior Day ceremony that will honor UNCP Baseball's Class of 2014, while kids will be invited to run the bases following Sunday's series finale.