PACE ELIMINATED FROM NE-10
TOURNAMENT;
FALLS TO SOUTHERN CONNECTICUT, 6-1
RINDGE, NH - The 5th seeded Pace University baseball team, ranked sixth in the latest NCAA Division II Baseball Northeast Region Poll, was eliminated from the Northeast-10 Conference Tournament earlier today falling to the #2 seed Southern Connecticut State University, by a score of 6-1. The Setters end their season with a 31-23 record and will await a possible at-large bid to the NCAA Division II Baseball Tournament. The Owls improve to 35-16 on the year and will play their second elimination game of the day later tonight against the loser of the winner's bracket game between #1 Bryant University and #3 Franklin Pierce University.
Pace was first to get on the board scoring their lone run of the game in the top of the first inning. Junior Andre Liscinsky (Trumbull, CT/Trumbull) led off the inning with a walk, advanced to second on a sacrifice bunt and later stole third to score on senior Chris Brown's (West Kingston, RI/South Kingston) RBI groundout to third.
Southern Connecticut answered quickly scoring a pair of runs in their half of the first. Mo Davidson singled to left and stole second to get into position to score on Anthony Fiorillo's RBI triple to left field to tie the game at one. Fiorillo would come in to score the go ahead run on Andrew Babb's RBI single through the left side.
The Owls would tack on another run in the bottom of the sixth on Babb's second RBI single of the day scoring Davidson to make it a 3-1 game. Southern Connecticut would blow the game open with a three-run eighth inning, taking advantage of a Pace fielding error that extended the inning. Paul Izzo's two-run single up the middle brought home Nick DeProspo and Karl Derbacher, while Izzo came in to score on Justin Cox's RBI single down the right field line.
The Setters were unable to find an answer for Owl's starter Toby Nylin (5-2), who tossed a complete game allowing one run on four hits and a walk, to go along with 11 strikeouts.
Junior Nicholas DeMeo (Farmingville, NY/Sachem
East) (4-2) started for Pace allowing two runs on five
hits, while striking out four batters. Sophomore MacKenzie
King (Blairstown, NJ/North Warren Regional) tossed three
innings out of the pen allowing four runs (one earned) on five
hits, walking one and striking out three.