Hoyas Rebound With Two Wins, Down Coppin State, Mt. St. Mary’s

BETHESDA, MD. – With six games remaining in the 2001 schedule, the Georgetown baseball team entered their last three home contests needing to win them all to finish with a .500 season record at Shirley Povich Field. After a 15-7 victory over Mount St. ary’s Tuesday night, Georgetown seemed poised to reach that goal versus Howard and Coppin State.

However, the Hoyas could only muster one victory, 12-4, over the Eagles while losing a shoddily played contest versus Howard, 6-5, Wednesday afternoon.

Although failing to break even in Bethesda, the Hoyas did improve their overall record to 16-37 (6-17 Big East) with all but one of those wins coming at home.

Over the three-game stretch, senior outfielder Marc Carlini extended his hitting streak to 16 games, the longest since outfielder Kevin DeSanto (’98) hit in 13 straight from March 7-22, 1998.

Since April 12 when Carlini’s streak began, he has batted .471 (24-51) with three doubles, one triple, eight RBI, 10 runs scored and six stolen bases. He has played in all but one of Georgetown’s 18 games over the 21-day period. He pinch ran and scored the winning run in game one of a doubleheader against Navy on April 18 but was not charged with a plate appearance in the 3-2 victory. He did not play in the second game, a 10-7 loss.

Carlini leads the Hoyas with a .341 batting average.

In Tuesday’s clubbing of Mount St. Mary’s, Carlini went 1 for 4 with two RBI but was overshadowed by the overall Hoya offensive assault. Each starter connected for at least one hit, while senior Eric Santana was the only starter not to record an RBI.

Freshman catcher Michael Lombardi, sophomore left fielder Jason Boice and senior center fielder Jim Vankoski each had three hits and knocked in two runs. Boice also scored twice, while Vankoski hit his third home run of the season.

Up 7-5 after seven innings, the Hoyas’ bats lit up, scoring eight runs in the bottom of the eighth to lay the ountaineers to rest.

“Our offense just buried them at the end,” Head Coach Peter Wilk said.

Boice walked, advanced to second on a ground out by junior second baseman Mike Green and stole third to open the inning. Vankoski drove him in with a single, Santana struck out and sophomore designated hitter Robert O’Hare reached on an error.

Then the floodgates opened with seven consecutive hits and seven more runs.

Starting senior Randy Erwin pitched 5 1/3 innings for his third win of the season. Senior Tony Pina shut down the Mountaineers for 2 2/3 before Georgetown erupted. Freshman Tim Nunziata allowed two runs on two hits in the ninth.

“That was a good win,” Wilk said.

If that was the case Tuesday, then Wednesday’s loss was a bad loss.

Georgetown left 15 men on base and blew a 5-4 lead in the ninth inning against Howard. The Hoyas had gone up one in the bottom of the eighth on a Santana RBI single to right, but could not hold on.

Vankoski, who had relieved sophomore right-hander Patrick Salvitti after the sixth, allowed a single to open the ninth. During the next at-bat Lombardi fired a strike to first that appeared to pick off the runner, but the Hoyas did not get the call.

After allowing another single to put runners on first and second, Vankoski attempted a second pickoff to first and this time was successful. Yet two hits later, Howard took the lead for good.

“We took them lightly,” Wilk said. “It’s something we hadn’t done all year – played a day game after a night game. We didn’t make an adjustment early. We didn’t step up. It was just awful.”

Pina would have entered the game in the ninth, but had to leave at 5:15 p.m. in the eighth inning because a professor would not let him out of class. Pina has recorded the Hoyas only five saves of the season.

In the victory over Coppin State, Lombardi hit his first collegiate home run in the seventh inning, a solo shot to deep right center. Lombardi joined O’Hare, sophomore third baseman att Carullo, senior shortstop Jay Catalano and senior right fielder Brian Cassesse with two hits apiece. Boice hit a two run homer, his third, in the fourth.

“We hit the ball and they weren’t very good,” Wilk said.

Carlini, who went one-for-two the day before, had one hit and made a terrific defensive play in center during the fifth. He dove on a line drive in the gap, caught the ball, bounced up and gunned the runner out at second for a double play.

The Hoyas play their final series of the year this weekend at West Virginia.