The Seton Hall baseball team overcame a five-run deficit but lost 6-5 to Fairleigh Dickinson in 10 innings on Friday afternoon.
Farleigh Dickinson’s Tom Ruscitti hit a walk-off single that scored Tristan Plescia and ended the Pirates’ hopes of picking up their first win of the 2019 season.
Farleigh Dickinson jumped out to an early five run lead, knocking out Pirates starter Noah Thompson by scoring one run in the first and four in the second. Thompson, a junior from Frisco, Texas, gave up five runs on six hits in one and two-thirds innings.
Blake Espinal relieved Thompson and came up big, holding Farleigh Dickinson’s bats at bay with four and a third scoreless innings, striking out four and scattering three hits.
The Pirates’ offense awoke in the top of the fifth. Sebastiano Santorelli reached on a two-base error, advanced to third on a wild pitch, and scored on sac-fly by Casey Dana. Matt Toke and Connor Hood both walked and scored on Alex Clyde’s two run triple that cut the opposition lead to 5-3.
Dana’s had an RBI single in the sixth, and an RBI ground out by Chris Villa in the seventh helped the Pirates tie the score at five. The Pirates had the winning run in scoring position in the seventh inning, but Jerry Huntzinger was thrown out at third base after the tying run scored on Villa’s ground out.
After Espinal exited in the sixth, Nick Payero and Ryan McLinskey held Farleigh Dickinson scoreless until Ruscitti’s single off McLinskey ended matters in the tenth.
The Pirates will head back in action in the series on Sunday and look to rebound against Dayton at 10 A.M.
Matthew Collins can be reached at matthew.collins@student.shu.edu.
