The WKU baseball team had its opening day spoiled with a 5-2 loss to Bradley on Friday at Nick Denes Field.

Bradley got some timely hitting and strong pitching from starter Noah Edders to take down the new-look Hilltoppers, with an opening day roster that features 32 new players.

“I busted their bubble here in the dugout and I said, ‘Well, I guess you guys aren’t going to go undefeated,’ ” WKU coach Marc Rardin said. “That’s just what it is – the game early on here the first four or five weeks is going to reveal you. Whatever I’ve been trying to do in practice and what we’ve been doing in practice, it’s going to show. It’s going to reveal you one way or another.”

WKU trailed all day, unable to mount a late rally.

An error on a potential double play allowed Bradley to plate a run, but Grant Burleson struck out two with a runner at third to keep the score at 1-0.

WKU tied it in the bottom of the second when Jaylin Rae tripled and came home on a sacrifice fly by Zayd Brannigan.

Burleson retired 10 straight before Bradley struck with back-to-back doubles from Logan Delgado and Michael Mylott to regain a 2-1 lead.

Burleson went four innings in his WKU debut, allowing three hits and two runs – one earned – with seven strikeouts, taking the loss despite the solid outing.

“Obviously not the outcome we wanted here on game one, but it is game one,” Burleson said. “We’ve got two more again this weekend and are looking to bounce back. Not bad, but I definitely have some improvements I can make and we can make as a team. I think we are going to be all right.”

It remained 2-1 until the seventh when Bradley added to the lead with a two-out rally off WKU reliever Cory Bosecker. Bradley had four hits in the inning, including a two-out RBI double from Jackson Chatterton and an RBI double by Timmy O’Brien to make the score 5-1.

“Do you know the stat is in at least 90% of college baseball games that the winning team will score as many as the losing team has total, they will score it in one inning,” Rardin said. “We lose 5-2 and they score three (in the seventh). I told the guys to go home tonight and when you are laying around and start looking at the scores, look at the line scores.

“It’s real, all those baseball cliches – watch out for the big inning, the crooked numbers. That’s going to get you.”

WKU got a run back in the bottom of the eighth with Ethan Lizama’s RBI single scoring Blake Cavill.

The Hilltoppers loaded the bases with one out in the bottom of the ninth, but Bradley reliever Anthony Pothoff got a strikeout and a ground out to snuff out the rally.

WKU finished 2-for-13 with runners in scoring position.

“We had as many hits (as Bradley),” Rardin said. “They got more two-out hits. They got extra base hits. They hit more balls, what we say, forward and we hit more balls up. Those are easier plays. There’s not a lot of bad hops up there. We were just a little bit more easier outs and they had some great two-out hits when they needed them.”

Edders earned the win, allowing one run and six hits over seven innings. The right-hander faced one over the minimum the final four innings.

“He was throwing strikes with three pitches,” Rardin said. “He was throwing fastballs when we were looking off-speed. He was throwing off-speed when we were looking fastballs. He kind of had us in the rocking chair. We have to be better and we have 55 more games to be working on that.”

The series is scheduled to continue at 2 p.m. on Saturday with the series finale scheduled for 1 p.m. on Sunday.

Bradley 100 100 300 – 5 10 0

WKU 010 000 010 – 2 10 1

WP: Edders LP: Burleson S: Potthoff.