BROOKVILLE, N.Y. – The LIU baseball team hosted Merrimack College for its Northeast Conference home opener on Friday afternoon, defeating the Warriors in extra innings, 6-5. This marks the third win in four games for the Sharks, including back-to-back 10 inning contests. With the victory, LIU improves to 15-10 and 2-2 in NEC action.
Merrimack tagged three runs in the opening frame to open with a quick 3-0 lead heading into the bottom of the first. After two quick outs,
EJ Exposito took a fastball to deep centerfield to draw closer to the deficit, making it 3-1 on his team-leading fourth homerun of 2022.
Joshua Loeschorn began to settle in to form in the second, forcing a flyout and groundout to retire the side. The Sharks left a runner on base in the second to keep the score at 3-1, Warriors.
In the top of the third, Loeschorn navigated out of a bases loaded jam that started with a double and two walks by forcing a flyout to left to end the inning. Moving to the bottom half, LIU began the inning with a single from
Jack Power and
Giovanni Ciaccio forcing a five-pitch walk. Moments later, Ciaccio would advance to third on a passed ball before
Luke Turner drew a walk to load the bases.
With a runner on every bag,
Carlton Harper earned an RBI by watching four balls to send home a run, making it 3-2. Immediately after the walk,
Christopher Wasson lined a single to right center to give the Sharks their first lead, 4-3.
Neither team would make much noise in the fourth, but the fifth inning gave LIU another run when
Seth Surrett hit a sacrifice fly to right to score Turner, increasing the advantage to 5-3. The Warriors would chip away by scoring on an error by Loeschorn in the sixth, trimming the lead to 5-4.
Nick DeSalvo came in to relieve Loeschorn in the seventh, but Merrimack tagged the tying run on the board on an RBI double from Stadnicki to lock the game at 5-5.
Entering the ninth inning with the game still tied at five apiece,
Josh Gainer was still on the mound after a frame of work in the eighth. After surrendering three base runners, Gainer forced a groundout to end the ninth. LIU went three up, three down to send the game to extra innings.
Gainer pitched another scoreless inning in the 10
th to give the Sharks a chance in the ninth. Wasson led off with an infield single, and Surrett laid down a sacrifice bunt to move him to second before Wasson would advance to third on a passed ball.
Colin Adams hit a soft grounder to third that resulted in an infield single, putting runners on the corners.
Power was hit by a pitch to load the bases, and with two outs, Wasson sprinted home on a passed ball to walk it off, 6-5. Gainer earned his first win of the season after three scoreless innings out of the bullpen.
Up next, the Sharks host Merrimack on Saturday, April 2 at 1:00 p.m.
