GALESBURG, Illinois - The Knox Prairie Fire baseball team were defeated by the Illinois Wesleyan Titans this Tuesday, losing by a final score of 23-4. With the loss, the Prairie Fire found their record for the season at 1-9.

Knox was put on their back foot early in the game, as the Titans struck for three runs in the first inning and never looked back. An unfortunate nine-spot for Illinois Wesleyan in the top of the third meant that the Prairie Fire found themselves in a nigh-insurmountable hole, although they were able to claw back three runs of their own in the bottom of the inning thanks to a Chris McTeague double and Chase Thies' third home run of the year. Errors proved to be a tough thing to control for Knox, as their seven errors on the day resulted in six unearned runs crossing the plate. Cole Tanner scored another run for the Prairie Fire in the bottom of the sixth off of a wild pitch, but by then Knox was unable to muster any more resistance, and the game ended in a loss.

"We hadn't played in over a week and it showed," said associate head coach James Clark. "Wesleyan is a good team and we gave them a good portion of their runs with sloppy defense and not executing. We will have to execute better in conference play if we want to win games."

The Prairie Fire will enter Midwest Conference play this Saturday when they travel to play a doubleheader beginning at 12:00 p.m. against Beloit.