EDINBURG – Junior Kevin Stevens took a no-hitter into the seventh, but The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley Vaqueros baseball team fell to the South Dakota State University Jackrabbits 3-1 on Friday at UTRGV Baseball Stadium.

Stevens struck out a career-high 12 batters. The only hit was a solo home run by Josh Falk with one out in the seventh that tied the game at 1.

Stevens has now pitched in parts of 16 innings, allowing hits in only three frames. He started the season with five hitless innings against Kansas State and then pitched two hitless innings at No. 24 Oklahoma State before allowing hits in the next two innings.

On the season, Stevens has allowed eight hits in 14.2 innings while striking out 23 and walking five.

Junior Ricky Gerik Jr. (0-1) followed with 1.2 innings of hitless ball. In the ninth, however, Gerik allowed a leadoff triple to Drew Beazley. One batter later, a wild pitch scored a run and Falk hit an RBI-single to give the Jackrabbits (2-6) the lead.

That made a winner of Brett Mogen (1-0), who struck out two in two scoreless innings.

Adam Mazur nearly matched Stevens pitch for pitch, striking out nine in seven innings. The Vaqueros (3-7) broke through in the fifth with three hits, including singles by juniors EJ Taylor and Darian Luper that set-up a run-scoring double by junior Jacob Hirsh to make the score 1-0.

Taylor finished a career-best 3-for-4. Senior Coleman Grubbs also had multiple hits, going 2-for-4.

UTRGV and South Dakota State play a doubleheader on Saturday at 3 p.m. Fans can bring their trading card collections and trade with other sports fans throughout both games.