Despite dreadful baseball conditions, including 45-degree chills and 20 mile-per-hour winds, the Tufts baseball team put together one of its finest weekends of the spring, completing a four-game sweep in a non-conference series against Hamilton. The Jumbos combined timely hits on Saturday with dominant pitching on Sunday to outscore the Centennials 33-13 on the weekend.
Tufts started the first game of Saturday's double-header on fire, pounding out 11 runs in the first three innings. The Jumbos' first five batters reached base safely and were knocked in with RBIs from sophomore third baseman Wade Hauser, junior left fielder Nate Izzo, and sophomore right fielder James Howard.
In the following frame, the Jumbos sent 11 hitters to the plate and accumulated six runs, the biggest blow coming from a bases loaded single off the bat of sophomore designated hitter Bryan Egan. Egan struck again in the bottom of the third inning, blasting a two-RBI double over the head of Hamilton center fielder Joe Jensen.
According to junior tri-captain pitcher Christian Sbily, the Jumbos offensive outburst to start the series helped give the team the necessary momentum to pull off the four -game sweep.
"Coming out in those first couple innings and getting on top right away brings a whole boost of confidence to us," he said. "It really set the tone for not only that day but the whole weekend."
Egan finished the game with three hits and four RBIs while Izzo and Hauser each contributed two hits and two RBIs of their own. Sophomore center fielder Connor McDavitt also played a major role in the win with three hits and three runs scored.
A victory in the second game on Saturday proved to be more difficult for Coach John Casey's team. Tufts scored two runs in the third inning after a leadoff double from sophomore second baseman Joe Harrington and RBI singles by Hauser and Izzo before plating three more runs in the fifth and one in the sixth. From there, however, the Centennials turned things around and rallied off of freshman reliever Matt Moser to tie the game at six entering the bottom of the ninth.
With just one out left in the game, Egan took first after being hit by a pitch and continued on to third following an error by Hamilton second baseman Brian Ferrel on Izzo's ground ball. Hamilton then elected to intentionally walk Howard to load the bases and face freshman designated hitter Mike Barry. With three runners on, Barry worked a walk off of junior Tommy Moriarty to secure the victory for Tufts.
The two wins on Saturday were largely due to the Jumbos' bats, but Sunday's doubleheader was headlined by the pitching staff. Junior Dean Lambert and freshman Andrew David put together remarkable performances, both throwing complete games while giving up just three hits apiece. The duo combined to allow just one run while fanning 13 Centennial hitters.
Reliable pitching has been key for the Jumbos all season, and junior tri-captain catcher Nick Cutsumpas credits the pitchers' ability to get ahead in the count as the reason for their success.
"It's basically being able to establish your fastball and something off-speed for strikes," he said. "We get in trouble when we fall behind in counts and start pitching to one side of the plate. When you go down 2-0 in the count, you're not going to go to an off-speed pitch, you're going to have to throw a fastball. Being able to move the fastball around consistently is key for us."
"Our staff has been doing a great job, and this weekend we were able to put it all together on the hill," Sbily added. "It really boils down to us throwing a lot of first pitch stirkes. It's something we stress all the time, getting ahead of hitters and if you go back and look all weekend we had a really high percentage of first pitch strikes."
With those impressive performances, Tufts rode the arms of Lambert and David to 6-0 and 7-1 victories. Senior shortstop Scott Staniewicz paced the Jumbos offense with four hits and two runs on the day, while senior tri-captains Eric Weikert and Cutsumpas each pitched in with two hits apiece.
With the four victories, Tufts improves to 13-7 on the season and has four days off before facing off against NESCAC East rival Trinity this weekend. The Bantams currently sit atop the NESCAC East standings with a 5-1 record. After dropping two of its first three conference games, the Jumbos acknowledge the significance of the upcoming series.
"We know a lot about Trinity just from playing against them every year, and we've seen what they've done so far this year against the teams in our division," Sbily said. "This week we're just working hard on seeing a lot of fastball away. We know how they are going to pitch us, and we know a lot of the hitters they have. We have some business to take care of against them after what they did to us last year, and we are looking forward to setting the tone on Friday."
