WINSTON-SALEM – Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains … and sometimes the other team has a plane to catch.

All of the above applies to this weekend’s baseball series between Louisville and Wake Forest. After splitting a doubleheader on Saturday – Friday night’s game was postponed – Louisville and Wake Forest’s rubber game on Sunday was ruled a 5-5 tie after 12 innings because of the Cardinals’ travel plans.

Sunday’s start time was moved up a half hour to 12:30 p.m., a move made to give these teams a little more time to get a full game in. It turned out that not even a full game plus three innings could decide it.

Louisville set a travel time of 4:45 p.m. entering the series – an agreed-upon time between both teams, and no inning can start after the designated time. Louisville flew commercially out of Charlotte and the Cardinals’ flight was moved up a half hour at some point this weekend.

“I talked to (Louisville coach) Dan (McDonnell) earlier in the week about his ability to bus home, quite honestly, and/or stay until Monday,” Wake Forest coach Tom Walter said. “And neither one of those was an option, unfortunately.”

That meant the only option left when the 12th inning ended with the score still tied was the rarest of outcomes in baseball – a tie, bringing an unresolved ending to what was an exhilarating game.

Wake Forest (33-14-1, 11-12-1 ACC) rallied from a 4-1 deficit, pulling even at 4-4 on a solo homer by Brendan Tinsman in the seventh and getting a ninth-inning homer from Nick Kurtz to send the game into extra innings.

That came after Kurtz, the big freshman first baseman who’s returned earlier than expected from a shoulder injury, made a few plays in the field that looked like he’d reinjured himself.

“The at-bat before, you saw he wasn’t feeling real good and you saw he tried to bunt. We weren’t sure he could even swing,” Walter said. “I went up to him and I was like, ‘Man, I need to know because we can pinch-hit for you here.’

“He was like, ‘You’re not pinch-hitting for me, I’m gonna hit a home run and tie this game.’”

In the bottom of the 12th, with both teams well aware that it was the last chance, Wake Forest put two runners on with singles and had the winning run at third base with two outs when Brock Wilken scorched a line drive to left field – which was caught by a well-positioned JT Benson.

“I think when you’re the home team, you’ve got to find a way to win that game,” Walter said. “But you know, Brock put a good barrel to the ball there at the end.”

The Deacons got to that point on the strength of 4 1/3 innings – 71 pitches – from closer Camden Minacci, whose resolve was similar to Kurtz’s.

“If it hadn’t been a curfew, he’d have been back out there because he wasn’t going to let us … take him out of the game,” Walter said. “He was ready to throw 100 pitches if need be, to help the ballclub win.”

Wake Forest was in position to win a series against Louisville for just the second time in eight matchups; the Deacons’ lone series victory against Louisville came in 2018.

Instead, this bizarre ending means it’s not a series won or lost – and it’s a missed opportunity, in that sense, for a Deacons team trying to move into steadier ground on the NCAA tournament bubble.

Then again, it’s not – because it’s a tie and everybody wins.

And nobody wins.

How hollow.

“I think that’s probably a pretty good word,” Walter said of that adjective. “You know, disappointed. You know, proud of our guys and the way they battled. But certainly disappointed we didn’t come out of there with a series win.”

There was a long enough wait for this series to start, another long wait when the first game finally started Saturday, and then a back-and-forth thriller to see who would win the series with Sunday’s rubber game.

Friday night’s game was originally pushed back one hour because of inclement weather, and then it was postponed and turned into a Saturday doubleheader. The first game of the doubleheader started at 11:30 a.m. and, because of a four-hour delay in that game, the second game ended around 11:30 p.m.

Sunday’s game was moved up by 30 minutes – in hindsight, maybe these teams should’ve gone from breakfast to the ballpark to make sure the game was decided.

**********

Here is a quick recap of the first two games in the series:

Wake Forest 14, Louisville 3 (Game 1)

Wake Forest blew open the first game with a pair of Brock Wilken two-run homers in the middle innings, and Wilken’s grand slam helped put the series-opening victory away after a weather delay of four hours.

The Deacons’ first three runs came on bases-loaded walks in the second inning. Louisville answered with a pair of runs in the third, so it was 3-2 when Wilken launched his first homer in the fourth. Wilken’s next shot made it 7-2 in the sixth, and his third homer put the Deacons up by 10 in the seventh.

Along with Wilken’s big day, Michael Turconi was 3-for-5 with two RBI, and Brendan Tinsman, Danny Corona and Lucas Costello had two hits apiece.

Rhett Lowder (9-2) picked up the win with six innings, allowing two runs on eight hits and a walk. The sophomore matched a career-high with 11 strikeouts. Gabe Golob pitched a scoreless inning and Seth Keener pitched the last two, allowing one run in the ninth on a wild pitch.

Louisville 6, Wake Forest 2

The offensive success didn’t carry over for the Deacons, who only managed six hits and struck out 14 times.

Wake Forest scored first, Tinsman coming home on a wild pitch in the second, but the lead didn’t last long. Ben Bianco hit a solo homer in the third, and Dalton Rushing hit on in the fourth off of Josh Hartle (5-5).

Hartle gave up another run in the fourth on JT Benson’s single, and was charged with a run in the fifth for the only batter he faced. Wake Forest used six relievers, with Reed Mascolo pitching three innings and allowing a run, and Derek Crum charged for a run that scored in the eighth.

Tinsman, Nick Kurtz and Adam Cecere – Wake’s 4-5-6 hitters – accounted for all six of the Deacons’ hits.