Salisbury, MD – Third baseman Alex Vitale (Severna Park, MD/Severna Park) went 3-for-5, including a home run and two RBI as No. 26 Salisbury battled back from four different deficits for a 15-10 victory over No. 10 Montclair State in NCAA Division III Baseball action at Sea Gull Field on Saturday afternoon.
Senior right fielder Andrew Jensen ( Millersville, Md. / Severna Park , MD ) had three hits and a pair of RBI for the Sea Gulls, who improved to 9-1 on the season in taking the first game of the weekend set with the Red Hawks. Salisbury also avenged a pair of losses to Montclair State last season.
Junior third baseman Rob Clark (Livingston, NJ/Seton Hall Prep) went 5-for-5 and drove in two runs for the Red Hawks (0-1), who pounded out 17 hits in their season opener.
Montclair State jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first as
ROB BOWNESS ( Sparta, NJ/Seton Hall Prep) reached on an error with one out and scored a Clark smacked a triple to center field. Catcher
ANDREW VICARO ( Randolph, NJ/Randolph) followed with an RBI double and he scored as
LOU POLITAN ( Livingston, NJ/Livingston) smacked a run-scoring single to left-centerfield. But Salisbury came right back as consecutive walks with one out and hit batter loaded the bases before Mark Bostwick ( Elkton , Md. Elkton) drew a bases-loaded walk to bring home the first run. Mike Celenza ( Gaithersburg , Md. Quince Orchard) and Jensen would then score on an error as the Sea Gulls tied the game at 3-3.
MSU would regain the lead in the third as Politan lofted a sacrifice fly to score Bowness, who led off the inning with single. But again Salisbury answered in similar fashion as Jensen tripled to lead off the bottom of the inning and scored on a sacrifice fly by Vitale. The Red Hawks would take a third lead in the game in the top of the fifth as Bowness, who had three hits, doubled to left-center and scored on Clark's RBI single to left to make the score, 5-4.
Salisbury would then take control with six runs in the home half of the fifth as Peter Callahan (Newark, DE/Newark) singled in a run to start the rally before Jenson closed out the inning with an RBI single as the Sea Gulls took a 10-5 lead.
Montclair would get within three runs in the sixth as
SCOTT EVANGELIST ( Northfield, NJ/Holy Spirit) connected on a two-run blast. Salisbury countered with two in the bottom half on RBIs by Randy Boyle ( Jarrettsville , Md. John Carroll) and Brian Camper ( Wilmington , Del. Mt. Pleasant) for a 12-7 lead. Runs batted in by Clark, Vicaro and Evangelist pulled MSU within 12-10 in the seventh, but Vitale homered in the bottom of the inning and the Sea Gulls tacked on two in the eighth for the final margin.
Righthander Ryan Bennick ( Wind Gap, Pa. Nazareth Area ) (3-0) picked up the win as he went the first five innings striking out five and walking just one while surrendering 12 hits and seven runs. Junior righthander
TIM STRINGER ( Annandale, NJ/ North Hunterdon) took the loss striking out eight in 4 1/3 innings.
Vicaro, Politan and Evangelist each had three hits for MSU while Bowness, an All-American in 2006, was 2-for-5 with three runs scored.
The Red Hawks conclude their weekend series with Salisbury on Sunday, March 4 at 1:00 pm.
