West Haven, CT – In the opening game of the Northeast-10 Championship weekend, Stonehill edged out the Adelphi University baseball team earlier today 2-1 on the campus of New Haven.
Despite picking up his first loss of the season, Johnathon Mulford tossed a complete game 8.0 innings with six strikeouts and just two hits and one earned run allowed.
Kory Cassara led the offense with two hits.
Freshman Michael Young gave the Skyhawks an impressive start, throwing 8.0 innings with four strikeouts and three hits allowed. He also only walked one batter.
The Skyhawks scored a run in each of the first two frames, the first one coming with two outs in the bottom of the first. Chris Hoyt led off the inning with a single through the right side and made his way to third after a sacrifice bunt and a wild pitch. Hoyt then scored the initial run on a Dan Fratus two-out single.
Eric Schneider led off the second by getting hit with a pitch and advanced to second on an error during a rundown. Schneider then hustled to third base to beat out the throw on an original sacrifice bunt and scored two batters later on a sacrifice fly from Ben Monte.
The Brown and Gold had their best scoring chance in the top of the fifth with runners on first and third and only one out. However, a fly out from
John Fogarty turned into a double play as Hoyt connected with Fratus and Schneider to throw out Murphy at home.
Looking to rally,
Kory Cassara led off the ninth inning with a single. With
John Cuttitta pinch running,
Nick Zito advanced him to third base with a single, however, being thrown out himself trying to get to second. With the Cuttitta standing at third,
Robert Vani picked up the RBI with a sacrifice fly to cut the deficit to 2-1. However, with two outs, Aubrey Solomon picked up the strikeout on Murphy to earn his eighth save.
The Panthers play next in the 10:00 am slot tomorrow morning back on the campus of New Haven at Frank Vieira Field as they will face the loser of the upcoming Franklin Pierce and New Haven while Stonehill will face the winner at 12:30 pm. Following, the winner of game one faces off against the loser of game two to move on to Championship Saturday.
