The Hofstra baseball team split a double-header with Sacred Heart University on Saturday, March 13 at University Field, losing the first game 4-3 but exploding for a school record-tying 27 runs in a 27-7 game two victory.
The win put the Pride at a 6-5 record and second place in the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) north division. Head coach John Russo also tied Jack Smith for the most career wins by a Hofstra baseball head coach with 179.
Graduate pitcher Jack Jett, who has been the Pride’s best pitcher so far this season, got the start in game one and allowed two earned runs over seven innings.
However, the Pride defense struggled behind him and cost him two unearned runs as well in the sixth inning.
“I’m still upset about the loss in game one,” Russo said. “I feel like that’s one we gave away and was really happy with the way Jett pitched. He gave us what we needed him to do with seven innings and he did enough to win.”
With the score 1-1 in the bottom of the fourth inning, Lane Harris drilled a double to left field and scored two batters later on a throwing error by Sacred Heart first baseman Steven Schoen.
That run put the Pride ahead 2-1, and they tacked on one more in the fifth to take a two-run lead. After singling up the middle with one out, Santino Rosso scored on a double to center field by Rob Weissheier to make it 3-1.
The Pride did not have their lead for long, however, and coughed it right back up the next inning. Following a hit by pitch to lead off the sixth, Hofstra center fielder Anthony D’Onofrio made a costly error on the next play and allowed Mark Smith to score all the way from first base.
Later in the inning, the Pioneers added two more runs and took the lead for good. Austin Markman tied the game with an RBI single and scored following two wild pitches from Jett and an error by shortstop Austin Gauthier.
Game two was a completely different outcome for the Pride as they plated a record-tying 27 runs on 24 hits.
Hofstra scored in every inning they came to bat and gave each Sacred Heart pitcher major trouble.
Eight batters tallied multiple hits in the game for the Pride, with five of them also reaching three or more. Anthony D’Onofrio drove in a team-leading five runs, with Nick Marrero right behind him with four.
“I’ve always thought we’ve had a really good offense, but we hadn’t necessarily broken out yet this year,” Russo said. “We had a few decent games against La Salle [University] and then we were pretty much non-existent against Villanova [University], but I thought we put in some really good work this week and we put up eight in game one and then the record at the end.”
Hofstra led 2-0 after two innings, but blew it wide open in the third with six runs off of Pioneers pitcher Luke Hansen. From there, Hofstra added five more in the fourth inning, seven in the fifth, four in the sixth, two in the seventh and one in the eighth.
Brad Camarda got the start for the Pride and fired five shutout innings before getting into trouble in the sixth. Sacred Heart finally got on the board, rallying for four runs and knocking Camarda out of the game after 5 2/3 innings.
“I’m happy we answered back in that next game and put up the runs and I was really happy with [Camarda] through five innings,” Russo said. “He had a tough deal where we scored in every inning so he had a lot of time in between innings and I think it finally wore him out there at the end.”
Hofstra will complete their four-game series with Sacred Heart on Sunday, March 14 at 1 p.m. as Jimmy Joyce takes the mound.
Photo courtesy of Hofstra Athletics
