Struggles at the Plate Leave Baseball With 6-0 ECC Loss to Queens College
Box Score FLUSHING, N.Y. (April 20, 2012) – The Mercy College baseball team struggled to get much going on offense, falling 6-0 in an East Coast Conference matchup at Queens College on Friday afternoon.
Queens improves to 9-21 overall and 4-12 in the ECC while Mercy drops to 6-28 (4-13).
Freshman Joe Pareres (Bronxville, N.Y.) and sophomore Matthew Cascello (Staten Island, N.Y.) carried a serious pitchers dual through two innings before Pareres ran into some trouble in the third when Queens loaded the bases with no outs and scored two on a double by freshman third baseman Nick LoBello (Baldwin, N.Y.). The Knights would get another three runs off Pareres before his day was over and scored a sixth unearned run off of sophomore Adam Rodriguez (Bronx, N.Y.) later.
Mercy struggled at the plate early before picking up its first hit in the sixth inning as freshman left fielder Chris Salvo (Yorktown Heights, N.Y.) singled to lead off. The Mavericks got a runner to third base before the inning was out, but were unable to bring him home.
Salvo finished 1-2 with a walk to lead the Mavericks, with freshman second baseman Vinny Orlando (East Meadow, N.Y.) and sophomore third baseman Ken Post (Closter, N.J.) also picking up hits without a single strikeout between the trio. Pareres struck out two batters over his five innings, while sophomore Brian McNamara (Brewster, N.Y.) and junior Ray Thaisz (Staten Island, N.Y.) each tossed a scoreless frame, with Thaisz and Rodriguez each notching a strikeout.
LoBello paced the Knights, going 2-4 with three RBI. Junior second baseman Rob Bernardo (Staten Island, N.Y.) went 1-4 with a walk, two runs and a stolen base, sophomore left fielder Joe Salanitri (West Islip, N.Y.) was 0-2 with three walks and a run and junior right fielder Steven Varela (Glendale, N.Y.) finished 2-4 with a pair of doubles and two runs scored. Cascello tossed a complete-game three-hitter, walking one and striking out five.
Head Coach Bob Greiner and the Mavericks will host Queens tomorrow, Saturday, April 21 for an ECC doubleheader starting at 1:30 p.m.
