The Cardinal baseball team kept rolling this weekend, winning all three games against Hamilton to take sole possession of first place in the NESCAC West. After nine divisional games, the Cardinals are 7-2 against NESCAC West opponents, and now only one victory away from qualifying for the conference tournament.
The weekend got off to an unusual start when Hamilton’s field was deemed unplayable due to weather on Friday, and both squads had to travel to nearby Rome, N.Y., for the series opener. Despite the potential distractions of the change of venue and the intermittent snow falling throughout the day, the Cards showed up playing to win, working three straight walks to open the game. Coming to the plate with the bases loaded, Brice Kelly ’10 made a productive out, scoring Kyle Weiss ’12 with a sacrifice fly. Batting after Kelly, Dave Skura ’12 worked another walk to reload the bases, and then Joe Giaimo ’11 cleared them with a three-run double as Wesleyan torched Hamilton starter Michael Caruso for five runs in the first inning. Caruso’s successors didn’t fare much better against a dangerous Wesleyan lineup, and the Cardinal offense stroked eleven hits and worked 11 walks in a 13-run effort. Hamilton’s pitching only managed to strike out one Wesleyan batter throughout the entire game, as Giaimo mixed a K into a day which he reached base five times and collected four RBI.
The first inning’s offensive production would have been sufficient for the entire game, as Cardinal starting pitcher Mike Barsotti ’12 dominated as usual, holding the Continentals to one run while striking out 12 in six innings of work. Michael Cifuentes ’10 was equally effective with his second save of the season. Despite entering the game with a 9-1 lead, Cifuentes earned the less common type of save, qualifying for the statistic by pitching the final three innings, conceding one unearned run as Wesleyan cruised to their 17th victory of 2010.
The Cards’ strong offensive and pitching performances managed to comfortably mask the fact that they committed four errors in Friday’s game.
“Fields are different in the northeast and we’re taking some time to adjust,” said Cifuentes, whose own ERA happened to benefit from one such error when his lone run allowed came in an inning extended by a fielding error. “We’re working hard to improve, and each day in practice the entire team is working to get better on defense.”
Wesleyan fielders did improve on Saturday, playing errorless defense behind Brett Yarusi ’12 as the hard-throwing right hander went all nine innings en route to his fifth victory this year, four of which have been complete games. Yarusi has now yielded only five extra-base hits this season, all of them doubles, and opponents have mustered a mere .642 OPS against the sophomore. The Continentals did reach Yarusi for a three-run second inning, however, and Hamilton starter Max Foster managed to hold Wesleyan to three runs through seven innings, pushing the first game, originally slated to be a seven-inning affair, to extra innings. In the top of the ninth, the Cardinal offense finally came to life, as Chris Bonti ’13 scored the go-ahead run courtesy of a Julian Sonnenfeld ’11 single. Wesleyan grabbed some insurance later in the inning when Derek Dettorre ’11 ripped a two-out single to score Weiss and Sonnenfeld.
Dettorre, who was held out of the starting lineup on Friday, stayed hot in the nightcap, driving in three runs as the Cards completed the sweep with a 5-4 victory.
“As a team, we’ve been stressing the importance of competing all-out every inning,” said infielder/ball magnet Nick Gonsalves ’10, who went hitless on the weekend yet earned his 12th career HBP. “We were successful in doing that against Hamilton, and it shows when guys get clutch hits and when pitchers throw well in pressure situations.”
In addition to Sonnenfeld and Dettorre’s clutch hits in the second game of the weekend, several players stepped up in pressure situations in the last inning of the series. Coming in to pinch-hit in the seventh, Ryan Coffey ’11 stroked a single, then yielded to pinch-runner Justin Freres ’11, who stole second. Both players had one at-bat between them all weekend, but came in off the bench in the final inning of a close to get their jobs done.
Later, up by three in the bottom of the seventh, starting pitcher Derek Lukin ’13 gave up two runs with two outs. With a runner on second and the winning run at the plate, the freshman rolled a grounder to third, and Alex Meadow ’12 made a good throw to first to end the threat and the game.
The Cardinals face a full slate of non-conference games this week, entertaining Springfield College on Wednesday before heading off to Albertus Magnus and M.I.T. on Friday and Sunday, respectively, to play double headers at each school. If the Cards do well in the next five games, they could be nationally ranked heading into their series against Williams. First pitch on Wednesday is scheduled for 4 p.m.
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