GU Wins One, Loses One to Navy

Hoya File Photo/The Hoya The Georgetown baseball team is struggling as of late.

The Georgetown baseball team ended a nine-game slide, their longest of the season, and sailed home with a 3-2 victory over Navy in the first game of a twilight double header Wednesday at Shirley Povich Field.

The Hoyas lost the second game 10-7.

In the opening battle with Navy, the Hoyas relied on a rare last-inning rally to break a 2-2 tie.

Junior Mike Green pinch hit for senior right fielder Brian Cassesse and lined a single up the middle to start the bottom of the seventh.

“[Green’s] been having good swings lately,” said Hoyas’ Head Coach Peter Wilk. “He did a great job coming off [the bench] cold.”

Sophomore lead-off hitter Jason Boice then sacrificed senior arc Carlini, who pinch ran for Green, to second. But error by the idshipmen’s third baseman Todd McKinney enabled Boice to reach first and Carlini to advance to third. With nobody out, sophomore second baseman Matt Carullo walked to load the bases.

After senior center fielder Jim Vankoski struck out, senior first baseman Eric Santana bounced a single through the right side of the drawn in infield that scored Carlini with the winning run. It was Santana’s 16th RBI of the year.

“He hit his patented 27-hopper through the right side,” Wilk said. “He’s been coming through in the clutch all year. A great job.”

The starter, junior right-hander Paul Perillo, allowed two runs over 5 2/3 innings, but did not figure in the decision.

“He just competed his ass off and deserved the win,” Wilk said. “His attitude was positive, and he just competed.”

Junior Tony Pina entered the game in relief with two outs in the sixth after Perillo lost his control, hitting Navy’s right fielder Willie Gury, walking first baseman Andy Mild and throwing a wild pitch that lead to Navy’s first run. The Midshipmen tied the game on an error by Catalano, but Pina got catcher Dominic Nicolini to pop-up to end the inning.

Pina gave up two hits in the top of the seventh, but escaped the jam to earn the win, his second.

Georgetown scored a run apiece in the first and third innings to seize a 2-0 lead that Perillo held up till the sixth.

Prior to the victory over the Midshipmen, Georgetown had not won a game in 13 days, their last win coming over Delaware State on April 5. Over that span, the Hoyas suffered three losses to Seton Hall, one to George Washington, two to No. 4 Notre Dame, two to Villanova and one to the University of Maryland-Baltimore County.

The closest and most disappointing of those defeats came at the hands of Villanova last Saturday, when Georgetown failed to muster any offense to support senior ace Matt Arizin, who threw a complete game four hitter, but lost 1-0, his second loss by that score.

Even with a 2-5 record, Arizin leads the team with a 3.67 earned run average and two complete games. He has allowed 20 earned runs in 49 innings pitched.

Despite the losing streak, the Hoyas did find reason to be optimistic.

“Notre Dame had the second best ERA in the nation and we scored 14 runs,” Wilk said. “That’s a huge positive for us.”

The Hoyas (10-32, 3-14 Big East) have won only two of their last 20 contests and lie in the basement of the Big East, both in conference play with .176 winning percentage and in overall record with .238 mark. They have 14 games remaining in their season to try to improve upon their 13-43 performance of a year ago.

But to do so they must play much more steady baseball.

“Mediocre teams are inconsistent,” Wilk said. “We need to bring consistency into this program. And we’re working on it. We need to put all three aspects [pitching, hitting and fielding] of our game together and we’ve done that very few times this year.”

The Hoyas face Connecticut this weekend for three games in Bethesda, Md.