ST. LOUIS, Mo. - After falling in game one of Saturday's doubleheader, the University of Illinois Springfield baseball team cranked out a season-high 15 hits and 12 runs to earn a split with Maryville, 4-5 and 12-7, at Weber Baseball Field.

The Prairie Stars' offense came to life in the second game of the day as 10 players recorded hits and six players drove at least one run in. Juniors Adam Warda (Skokie, Ill.) and Aaron Kuper (Highland, Ill.) each collected three hits. Warda drove in a pair of runs and scored three of his own. Kuper finished with three RBI. Freshman Michael Rothmund (Lombard, Ill.) homered for the second consecutive day. He went 2-for-5 at the plate with two runs scored and three RBI. The trio produced five of the team's eight hits in game one.

Junior Matt Farrington (Orland Park, Ill.) picked up his second win of the season after tossing seven innings and allowing two earned runs while striking out three.

The Prairie Stars fell behind early after Maryville scored two runs in the bottom of the second inning. In the top of the third, however, UIS jumped ahead with four runs. With runners on second and third with two outs, Rothmund delivered a RBI-single to center field to get the visitors on the board. In the next at-bat, Warda smoked a double to left center, driving in two more. Kuper finished off the inning with a run-scoring single to make the score 4-2 in favor of the Prairie Stars.

Another RBI-single from Kuper in the fifth gave UIS a 5-2 advantage.

Maryville chipped away at the UIS lead with runs in the fifth and the sixth. A home run by Rothmund in the top of the seventh opened up the floodgates as the Prairie Stars scored seven runs in the final three innings. The Saints rallied with three runs in the eighth but couldn't get any closer.

Junior Christopher Irwin (Hiram, Ga.) got the start in the first half of the doubleheader. The Hiram native struck out seven batters over 5 2/3 innings of work. He allowed four runs but only one earned run.

UIS got on the board first in the top of the second when Aaron Kuper connected on a RBI-double to right center. The Saints answered in the bottom half of the frame with a run of their own. The score remained tied until the sixth inning. Maryville took advantage of three hits and two UIS errors to score four runs.

The Prairie Stars rallied in the top of the seventh. With the bases loaded and two outs, junior Mark Self (Algonquin, Ill.) drove home a couple runs with a single up the middle to make the score 5-3. The next batter, junior Lance LeBaron (Coon Rapids, Minn.) followed with a doubled to right field, driving in another run to pull UIS within one run, 5-4. The comeback ended there as the Saints took game one of the day, 5-4.

"We made a late run in game one today but weren't able to overcome a few costly mistakes," said head coach Chris Ramirez. "Our guys showed a lot of fight in game two. Our hitters finally got going and hopefully we can carry that into tomorrow and win the series."

UIS wraps up its series with Maryville tomorrow at 12 p.m.