By Vinny Amodeo
Adelphi drops both ends of the double header to power house Franklin Pierce
Game 1
Franklin Pierce made their way to Garden City in an attempt to pick up a few road wins against another team in the NE-10 and came out successful. Pierce took game one of the double header by a score of 4-0 on the back of senior pitcher Miles Sheehan. Sheehan threw eight scoreless innings, recording 11 strikeouts and surrendering just two walks.
Robert Vani at the plate (Photo credit: Vinny Amodeo)
The Ravens scored all of their runs from the sixth inning on as Adelphi brought the heat from the bump on this cold and gloomy afternoon.
Senior captain Jonathan Mulford didn’t disappoint as he gave up just two earned runs in 6 2/3 innings pitched for the Panthers. Mulford struck out nine and only walked two in his second start of the season. He made his way through five full innings of play with a no hitter intact before Pierce’s shortstop Justin Brock singled up the middle to start the sixth inning.
“My mindset going into the game was to pitch inside from the set,” said Mulford. “Hitters don’t want to hit balls when the ball is coming in on their hands. I pitched well, just made a bad pitch in a big spot”
The game began to slip away from the Panthers as Pierce strung together a few fortunate plays in the next few innings. A balk from Mulford led to Brock advancing to third, which inevitably preceded him scoring on a hit by junior third baseman, Jay Jabs.
The hit by Jabs opened up the scoring in the game and was followed by two straight innings in which the Ravens put a crooked number up on the board. Franklin Pierce added one run in the seventh and two more in the eighth.
The game was virtually over in the eighth as the Ravens jogged their closer out to the mound in the ninth, Tanner Bird. Bird threw a scoreless ninth, while striking out two of the four batters he faced.
Game 2
Game two strolled to the same beat as the first, as all of the scoring took place in just three innings of play. The Ravens threw sophomore Anthony Matarazzo to combat Adelphi’s TJ Santiago. This game, much like the first, was a complete pitchers duel with Franklin Pierce securing the win by a score of 3-2.
Santiago was in it for the long haul as he threw all seven innings, while Pierce used three pitchers in total. Santiago gave up three earned runs on just four hits and struck out six, while the combination of arms for the Ravens struck out three and gave up two runs on 10 hits.
“Going into today I knew it was going to be a battle,” said Santiago. “I threw everything with confidence and pitched to contact. Knowing that this team was a top team in the nation definitely lit a fire under all of us.”
Sophomore Cam Orologio was the first to make an impact on this game as he belted a home run over the left field wall to give the Panthers a 1-0 lead in the second inning. This lead was short lived as the Ravens executed a solid inning of baseball in the fourth, which led to all three of their runs.
Two singles and an intentional walk led to an RBI single by the designated hitter, Chris LaVorgna, which scored Matt Burns. A fielder’s choice led to the second run in the inning in which Jay Jabs scored to take the lead. Then a perfectly executed delayed steal by Kurtis White allowed Max DiTondo to score before the Panthers were able to tag White and record the third out.
The Panthers couldn’t seem to get the big hit that they needed to win either game. They stranded a total of 16 runners on the afternoon, including multiple innings that featured the bases loaded with one out.
“I think we are swinging the bats well collectively,” said junior captain Rob Vani. “We had 10 hits in 7 innings in game 2, but it is all about the clutch hit with RISP and I think it will come more consistently in the future. I think we had opportunities in both games to cash runners in, but they made pitches when they needed to get out of jams and they dodged the big hit all day.”
The Ravens are scheduled to play two against Dowling tomorrow, March 6, which comes before six more away games until they travel to Cary, N.C. on March 17.
The Panthers will host Southern Connecticut tomorrow, March 6, before traveling to southern Florida on March 11 for a week of games in Miami and Boca Raton.
