May 22, 2010

Box Score

Photo Gallery

TRENTON, NJ - The Johns Hopkins baseball team fell, 9-6, to Kean in the first game of the championship round of the NCAA Mid-Atlantic Regional Saturday afternoon. The regional champion and the trip to Appleton, WI will be decided by the winner of tomorrow's winner-take-all championship game at 1:00 pm. The Blue Jays are now 42-5 overall while the Cougars are 39-11.

Kean out hit Hopkins 11-to-10 but also made four errors compared to the Blue Jays' one. Hopkins scored four unearned runs in the game but it was not enough to overtake Kean.

Michael Moceri scored three runs on three hits for Kean. Ken Gregory had three RBIs on two doubles in a 2-for-3 game. Lee Cavico had two hits and three RBIs while Ryan Gibbons had two hits and two runs scored.

Sam Wernick (Dallas, TX/Dallas Jesuit College Prep) was the highlight for the Blue Jays with three hits and two runs scored. James Teta (Centereach, NY/Sachem) scored three runs and had two singles. Stephen Bejsiuk (Moorestown, NJ/Moorestown) also had two hits, including a double. Bejsiuk also made a stellar diving play in shallow right field and got up just in time to throw out the Kean batter in the seventh inning.

Kean scored first in the opening frame when Gibbons scored on a double to right center by Gregory. Hopkins tied the score in the bottom of the inning on a pair of Cougar errors and then took a 3-1 lead with two runs in the second. Brian Youchak (Pittsburgh, PA/Vincentian Academy) had the RBI in the first inning. Bejsiuk hit a one-out double in the second and scored on a Teta fielder's choice. Teta then scored on an RBI single by Wernick, who scored the run in the first inning.

The Cougars chipped away at the Blue Jay lead by scoring a run in the fourth inning. Moceri led the inning off with a double to right field and would later score on a sacrifice fly by Nick Nolan.

Kean then took a 4-3 lead in the fifth. Gregory ripped his second double of the game, this time to left center, to score Gibbons, who was hit by a pitch, and Moceri, who singled.

The Cougars scored three more runs in the sixth as the first three batters of the inning came around to score. Nolan led off the inning with a single and scored on a home run over the left field fence by Lee Cavico. The next batter, Chris Carrano, walked and would later score on a wild pitch.

The Blue Jays answered with two unearned runs of their own in the bottom of the sixth to make the score 7-5. Teta and Wernick hit back-to-back singles with two outs. They both scored on a Kean error.

Another unearned run in the eighth for the Blue Jays put them down just one run entering the ninth inning. Teta reached on a single up the middle and scored on a Cougar overthrow at first base.

Kean added two runs in the top of the ninth to push its lead to three. Dylan Laguna walked with the bases loaded and Cavico singled home Moceri right before Gregory was thrown out at the plate on an assist from Blue Jay right fielder Jesse Sikorski (Syracuse, NY/Christian Brothers Academy).

Hopkins brought the tying run to the plate with two outs in the bottom of the ninth but could not push any runs across the plate to make the final score 9-6.

Stephen Montalbano pitched a complete game in the win to improve to 7-4 on the season for the Cougars. He allowed just two earned runs on 10 hits. He had five strikeouts and one walk.

Marco Simmons (Baltimore, MD/Gilman) took the loss for the Blue Jays by allowing four runs on six hits in 4.2 innings of work. He had four strikeouts and one walk.

The regional championship will be decided tomorrow when Hopkins takes on Kean at 1:00 pm.