BATON ROUGE – Burrell Jones made the most of his first start of the season and second as a McNeese Cowboy when on Wednesday night he threw five hitless and scoreless innings and struck out seven batters in a 10-3 win over Southern.
 
Jones (1-0) walked one batter and faced just two over the minimum. Tyler Brown, Brian Shadrick and JT Moeller combined to throw the final four innings to close out the win.
 
McNeese improves to 5-4 with the win and will next be in action this weekend when it hosts George Washington in a three-game series beginning Friday night at 6. Southern fell to 4-4 with the loss.
 
The Cowboys put 14 hits on the board with a double, triple and two home runs.
 
Payton Harden (2-5), Brad Burckel (2-4), Kade Hunter (2-4), Dean Bittner (2-4) and Taylor Darden (2-2) each had multiple hits.
 
Cooper Hext popped his third home run on the year while Hunter hit his first.
 
Southern starting pitcher Antoine Harris (0-2) took the loss after he allowed six runs on eight hits.
 
McNeese led 1-0 in the first inning when Burckel scored Harden. The Cowboys added five runs in the third inning off a two-run homer by Hext, a Josh Leslie triple that scored Harden, another Burckel RBI single and a Bittner single.
 
The Cowboys held a 10-0 lead before Southern scored a couple in the sixth and one in the seventh.