Baseball Rolls Past Brandeis, 9-4

Worcester, MA --- Freshman Adam Barry (Auburn, MA) collected a pair of hits including a his first collegiate homerun to go with three RBI's to help lead Worcester State past Brandeis, 9-4, in non-conference baseball action this afternoon at the Lyons Baseball Diamond.

With the win the Lancers even their record at 10-10 while the Judges fall to 10-13 with the setback.

Barry started the scoring for the Blue and Gold when he belted a one-out, two-run homer high over the right field fence before three straight singles led to another score for the hosts. Junior Cody Osburn (Sacramento, CA) crossed home when sophomore Dennis Duplessis (Marlboro, MA) sent a hard groundball up the middle for the 3-0 advantage after the opening inning.

Brandeis collected a run of their own in the top half of the second when senior Dominic Schwartz (San Francisco, CA) knocked in junior Kyle Brenner (Brookfield, MA) who had doubled one batter earlier for the 3-1 score.

The Lancers tacked on three more runs in the bottom half of the inning with one swing of the bat from junior Jeff Bolio (Oxford, MA) who blasted his first homer of the season deep to centerfield for the 6-1 edge.

The Blue and Gold added on another score in the bottom half of the fourth when Bolio hit a run producing ground out with the bases loaded for the six-run advantage.

The Judges answered that score with one of their own in the top of the fifth when Brenner scampered home on a wild pitch to make the score 7-2.

Brandeis cut into the deficit even more in the top of the eighth inning with a pair of scores.

Sophomore Greg Heineman (Wilbraham, MA) laced an RBI double to right center with runners on the corners and junior Tom McCarthy (Yonkers, NY) was heads-up and came home on a throwing error for the 7-4 score.

Worcester State responded again with a pair of insurance runs in their half of the inning on an RBI single by Barry and a run producing base-knock from senior pinch-hitter Joe Carlier (Rockland, MA) for the final score.

WSU outslugged the visitors 11-9 for the game.

Junior classmates David Ruggiero (Peabody, MA) and Nick Gikas (Danvers, MA) joined Barry with multiple hits as they each went 2-for-4 on the day and combined to score three times while Bolio finished with four runs batted in.

Heineman, Brenner, Schwartz, and sophomore Max Hart (Montville, CT) each collected a pair of safties for the Judges.

Junior right-hander Jared Kuzio (Franklin, MA) picked up the win to improve to 1-2 on the year after tossing eight innings on 97 pitches, surrendering four runs (three earned) on nine hits with four strikeouts and one walk.

Brandeis senior Colin Markel (Scarsdale, NY) fell to 1-3 on the season with the loss. Markel pitched the first three innings giving up six earned runs on seven hits without striking out or walking a batter.

Worcester State has a quick turn-around as they host WPI tomorrow at 3:30 PM while Brandeis returns home to face-off with Western New England Thursday at 3 PM.

Story By John Hanna --- Sports Information Graduate Assistant

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