STANDISH, Maine – Saint Joseph's College (5-7) suffered a 6-2 setback at the hands of Endicott College (8-3) in the team's 2022 home-opener at Larry Mahaney Diamond on Tuesday afternoon.
HOW IT HAPPENED:
The Gulls took advantage of four SJC errors as six Saint Joseph's pitchers combined to allow just one earned run in the 6-2 loss.
Third baseman Kyle Grabowski put the visitors on the board with a sac fly in the top of the second and helped the Gulls claim a 2-0 lead when he scored on an infield error in the top of the fourth. Endicott took a 3-0 advantage when designated hitter Nickolas Perkins worked a bases-loaded walk in the fifth inning.
The Monks finally pushed a run across in the bottom of the fifth when senior third baseman Ronan Chisholm (North Chatham, Mass.) walked and later scored on a Dawson Gundlah (York, Maine) sac fly.
The teams traded runs again in the sixth, as center fielder Caleb Shpur notched an RBI double for the Gulls and SJC junior catcher Jonathan Dube (Rochester, N.H.) delivered sophomore first baseman Luke Stephens (Glastonbury, Conn.) with a single to center, making it a 4-2 game through six frames.
Endicott added a pair of insurance runs – both unearned – off three hits and an SJC error in the eighth to account for the 6-2 final.
ON THE MOUND:
- Freshman starter Jason Johnson (Thomaston, Conn.) pitched very well but suffered the loss despite allowing just two unearned runs on five hits and no walks with four strikeouts over four innings
- Brian Berthiaume (New Boston, N.H.), Hugh Barrett (Durham, Conn.), Ben Gravel (Rochester, N.H.), Matthew Bergeron (Salem, N.H.) and Devan Harrison (Pocasset, Mass.) combined to allow four runs (one earned) on six hits with four K's in five innings of relief
- For Endicott, starter Nicholas Cannata earned the victory after allowing one run on three hits and three walks with five strikeouts in five innings and reliever Max Tarlin picked up his second save of the season after yielding a run on three hits with four K's in four innings
OFF THE BAT:
- Chisholm was 1-for-2 with a run and a pair of walks
- For Endicott, Shpur, Joseph Millar and Robbie Wladkowski tallied two hits apiece
HISTORICALLY SPEAKING:
With the loss, Saint Joseph's falls to 19-9 in the history of the series with Endicott College, a team the Monks had defeated in three-consecutive meetings going into today's contest.
NEXT!
Saint Joseph's will host Johnson & Wales University on Saturday in a Great Northeast Athletic Conference (GNAC) doubleheader with the first game starting at 1:00 PM.
