The Georgetown University baseball team traveled to Orange, N.J., to square off against the Seton Hall Pirates in a three-game series this past weekend. The Hoyas, looking to build on a strong 2-1 start to conference play, dropped two of their three matchups to the Pirates to level their conference record at .500.

Georgetown’s (19-15, 3-3 Big East) offense hit the ground running in game one of the series. After a scoreless first, sophomore catcher and first baseman Owen Carapellotti and junior infielder and outfielder Michael Eze both reached on singles in the second. First-year outfielder and pitcher Cody Bowker drove in the game’s first 2 runs on a single, and the Hoyas jumped out to an early 2-0 lead. 

Unfortunately, the Pirates (16-15, 2-1 Big East) had an immediate answer, knotting things up at 2 apiece with the bottom half of the inning highlighted by a triple.

Georgetown spent no time getting the lead back. Graduate first baseman and outfielder Ubaldo Lopez doubled with 1 out in the top of the third, setting the stage for junior first baseman and outfielder Jake Hyde to launch his 9th homer of the year — a 2-run shot that put the Hoyas up 4-2. 

Graduate pitcher Cody Jensen kept the opposing lineup quiet until the fifth, when he was eventually pulled with 2 outs after allowing Seton Hall to tie the game. Graduate pitcher Garret Keough then notched a quick strikeout that got Georgetown back in the dugout. 

The Hoyas struggled to muster any offense for the rest of the game while the Pirates broke it open. First-year pitcher Kai Leckszas got pinned with the loss after allowing the go-ahead run in the sixth. Seton Hall added on 3 more in the eighth, ultimately taking game one by a score of 9-4. 

Sophomore pitcher Andrew Williams turned in a brilliant game-two performance to even the series. The lefty tossed six shutout innings, allowing just 4 hits and 2 walks and striking out four. 

Georgetown’s offense once again struck first. Carapellotti singled to lead off the game, Lopez doubled and Hyde walked, loading the bases for Eze. Although he grounded into a double play, Carapellotti scored, giving Williams a 1-0 lead before he toed the rubber.

The Hoyas tacked on another run in the second inning after Bowker drove in graduate infielder Austin Kretzschmar on a triple. Georgetown made it three straight innings with a run to start the game, as Hyde scored on a sacrifice fly by junior first baseman Christian Ficca in the third. 

Both sides went quiet until the eighth. Eze led off the inning with a walk, stole second and reached third on a flyout. Junior outfielder Andrew Bergeron singled him home to make it a 4-0 ballgame.

Bowker picked up the last three innings, allowing no runs on no hits, 1 walk and 2 strikeouts, earning the second save of his young college career. Georgetown was victorious, shutting the Pirates out 4-0. 

Georgetown baseball Head Coach Edwin Thompson said strong play on both offense and defense resulted in the decisive game-two victory.

“Defensively we played really clean and on offense, Bowker had another great day for us. With a double and triple,” Thompson said in a Georgetown Athletics press release. “And Andrew Bergeron was stellar as well, going 2-for-3.”

Graduate pitcher Jake Bloss started the rubber match of this series. He tossed five innings, allowed 3 runs on 5 hits and 1 walk, and struck out 5.

Despite accumulating 8 hits and putting runners in scoring position multiple times, the Hoyas were shut down by the Pirates’ pitching staff. Lopez, Ficca and Bergeron generated the bulk of Georgetown’s scoring chances on doubles but were left stranded.

The Hoya bullpen was encouraging despite the loss. Graduate pitcher Jordan Yoder, Keough and senior pitcher Carson Frye combined to work three innings, allowing just 1 run. 

The story of game three was undoubtedly Seton Hall catcher Staus Pokrovsky. He went 4-for-4 with a single, a double and 2 homers, both scoring and driving in 3 of the 4 Pirate runs. Seton Hall sailed the rest of the way, sealing both a game three and series victory.

Georgetown then traveled to College Park, Md., and defeated the Terrapins of the University of Maryland (19-13, 4-2 Big Ten) in a thrilling 10-9 extra-innings victory April 11. The next day, they traveled to Baltimore, Md., and walloped the Retrievers of University of Maryland, Baltimore County (14-15, 5-4 America East) by a score of 13-4. The Hoyas will be back in action this weekend as they are set to play a three-game series against the Creighton University Bluejays (14-12, 2-1 Big East) here in Washington, D.C.