MT. CARMEL, ILL. – A sterling mound performance and two moonshot home runs were highlights of the first home weekend of the baseball season for No. 1-ranked Wabash Valley.

The Warriors (11-2) outslugged South Suburban, 18-9, on Sunday after sweeping a doubleheader against St. Charles, MO on Saturday, winning by 6-2 and 12-5 scores.

"We'll definitely take three wins," said WVC coach Rob Fournier. "Our guys played hard. There's a lot of things we need to work on, but it was really good to see our guys compete and play at home."

The aforementioned histrionics all occurred in the opener on Saturday. To begin with, there was lefthanded sophomore Cameron Tullar, who dazzled in a 5 1/3-inning stint as the starter. Of the 16 St. Joseph batters he retired, 14 came via the strikeout – a feat that even surprised Fournier.

"Cameron was lights out," Fournier said. "I don't know if that's some kind of record but it was a phenomenal performance. He's pitching so well sometimes you take it for granted."

Tullar (4-0) gave up only two hits – one of them a second-inning home run by Justin Diaz that gave the Cougars a short-lived 1-0 lead.

In the bottom half of the second, the Warriors countered with two runs – the tying run on a fielding error, the go-ahead tally on a double by Ole Arntson.

Then came the home runs.  Hylan Hall's two-run shot in the third was part of a 3-run inning that put the hosts in command, 5-1. And in the fifth, Arntson unleashed a solo bomb which seemed to clear the left-field fence in an eyelash, accounting for the final score.

In the second game against St. Charles (2-6), the Cougars again jumped in front, scoring twice in the first inning. The Warriors again answered quickly, with six runs of their own. The biggest blow came from Mason Minzey, who lashed a two-out, two-strike, bases-loaded triple to right.

The Warriors added five more runs in the third to put things away. Starter Austin Peterson (2-0) got credit for the win, going 2 2/3 innings.

The Sunday single game against South Suburban (3-5) featured 27 runs and 25 hits between both teams. And for the third straight game, the visitors watched an early-lead vanish. South Suburban hit the board with one run in the second inning, but WVC came back with three in the home half, then added two runs in the third and three more in the fourth to take an 8-1 lead.

The scoring numbers by inning got even larger as the game progressed. The Highlanders put up three runs in the fifth and five in the seventh. But, there was no stopping the Warriors offense on this day, as they cut loose for four runs in the sixth, and six more in the bottom of the seventh.

Adam Grob hit two home runs and drove in four in the game. The USC-Upstate commit has a team-high HR total of four. And his 15 RBIs are second on the team, behind the 16 of Jacob Plastiak.

"It was nice to see the offense get going in the game," Fournier said. "We kind of sputtered in the first part of the game. But we scored some big runs with two-out hitting."

C.J. Weins (3-0) picked up the win, going 4 2/3 innings. He allowed only three hits and fanned eight batters.

The top-ranked Warriors host Vincennes for a single game on Tuesday, before heading to Belleville on Thursday to open Great Rivers Athletic Conference play at Southwestern. That single-game open to the series will be followed by a Saturday doubleheader at home.

WVC will carry a 28-game GRAC winning streak into the series, including a 27-0 sweep through the field last year.