April 25, 2005

Box Score

BALTIMORE, MD -- Junior Jason Thayer scattered eight hits over seven innings and struck out nine while walking just two to lead the 21st-ranked Johns Hopkins baseball team to a 9-4 win over Gettysburg Monday afternoon. The Blue Jays won for the 10th time in their last 11 games and improve to 23-6 overall and 10-4 in the Centennial Conference. Gettysburg slips to 17-17, 10-6.

After allowing a single on the first pitch of the game Thayer gave up just one more hit through five innings. At the same time the Blue Jays were scoring in each of those innings en route to building a 9-0 lead against junior Ross Hempel.

Junior Gary Rosenberg homered to right field with two outs in the first to give the Blue Jays a 1-0 lead, while Rob Sanzillo added an RBI-double and Ian Christie a run-scoring single to push the lead to 3-0 at the end of two.

The Blue Jays doubled their lead to 6-0 with three more runs in the third inning as Eric Nigro's team-leading ninth home run of the season also plated Rosenberg, who had opened the bottom of the third with a walk. Mike Durgala doubled to left field and later scored on an RBI-single by Dave Montegari to account for the third run in the three-run third inning.

With Thayer working through the Gettysburg lineup quickly, the Blue Jays kept on Hempel. Durgala added a two-run double in the fourth and Sanzillo added his third home run of the season in the fifth to push the lead to 9-0.

Hempel, who went the distance for his eighth complete game of the season in nine starts, settled down after the fifth and allowed just one hit over the sixth, seventh and eighth innings.

At the same time the Bullets began to chip away. Senior Matt Sweeney's RBI-single in the sixth plated Joe Bonyai and ended the shutout. The Bullets added two more runs in the seventh on run-scoring singles by Sweeney and Brian Pernice to pull within 9-3, but junior Andrew Bail came in to relieve Thayer in the eighth and allowed just a two-out solo home run by Pernice in the top of the ninth before striking out Sweeney to end the game.

Thayer (4-1) improves to 4-1 on the year and 11-1 in his career with the win. Sanzillo, who tied the JHU single-game record with three doubles in last week's 16-8 win over Gettysburg, was 2-for-4 with a run scored and the two RBIs. Rosenberg was 2-for-4 with three runs scored an an RBI, while Durgala was 2-for-4 with a run scored and two runs batted in.

Hempel allowed all nine runs on 10 hits in eight innings. He struck out seven, but issued four walks. All four Hopkins players who walked in the game came around to score. Pernice, Sweeney and Austin Ball all collected a pair of hits in the game for Gettysburg.