Strong winds from left to right field did not stop the Hofstra Pride’s synergy from enabling the team to come out on top over the College of Charleston on the first day of a three-day Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) home-opener series.
Pitcher Michael O’Hanlon ended the ballgame with a strikeout, ending the cloudy and overcast day with an 8-6 victory for Hofstra. This game brought the Pride and the previously undefeated Charleston Cougars to an identical 3-1 record in the Colonial Athletic Association.
The Cougars came in swinging with JT Marr’s home run in the first inning. Scoring went in quick succession in the second inning, when Charleston player Luke Wood hit a home run himself, followed by a sacrifice fly hit by Sam Cochrane and scored by Joseph Mershon.
The third and final home run by the visiting team was enough to center the Pride’s morale and launch them headfirst into scoring. Second baseman Santino Rosso got the ball rolling when he hit a single, which would then give him and Anthony D’Onofrio ample room for scoring. D’Onofrio walked, and Brian Morrell tripled to center field.
Next up was Steve Harrington, whose walk made ripples in the following moments of the game. Jake Liberatore hit a single, giving Morell the chance to hit and Harrington an opening to advance to third base.
After that, it wasn’t long before Kevin Bruggeman hit his single for Harrington to advance and score and to set Liberatore on the same path, ending the third inning with a whopping six runs and five hits, comparable to six runs and four hits in Hofstra’s game against Elon University on March 27.
In the meantime, the coaching staff was not afraid to be cautious with the players. “I said, ‘Listen, we got three games this weekend. We can’t put too much stress on the bullpen,’” said Hofstra head coach Frank Catalanotto when discussing when to start changing pitchers, weighing how it could impact this game and upcoming ones.
Hofstra scored its final run when Morrell singled in the fourth inning, giving D’Onofrio the eighth run of the day.
The next four innings were a stalemate, top and bottom halves going 0-0 from the fifth to the eighth, thanks to pitchers Mark Faello and Aljo Sujak.
“We tell him, ‘Just throw strikes, and you’re going to get outs,’ and that’s what [they] did,” Catalanotto said, showing the strength of the team’s faith in its pitchers.
Charleston’s players coordinated when Preston Hall singled, allowing freshman Tyler Sorrentino to score in the ninth inning, an awakening jolt after a complete lack of scoring following such heavy scoring in the first few innings.
O’Hanlon’s ability to strike out Charleston in the last moments of the top half of the ninth inning was only even more important because Charleston had three runners left on base, leaving them oh-so-close to answering back at Hofstra.
It’s up to the baseball team to see how their 11-9 record will be affected by the remainder of this CAA series against the Cougars as it continues on Saturday, April 2, as a doubleheader, with the first pitch at 11 a.m. and then at 2:30 p.m.
Photo courtesy of Adam Flash/The Hofstra Chronicle
