Lehigh University
Holy Cross
Lehigh moves into first place tie with Sunday sweep
4/17/2005 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
The pair of Lehigh wins on Sunday also propels the Mountain Hawks into a tie atop the Patriot League standings with Army, who split a Sunday doubleheader at Bucknell.
”Kyle [Collina] came up huge with a great effort and [Joe] Ercolano got the clutch hit when we needed it in the first game,” said Lehigh head coach Sean Leary.
In game one, junior pitcher Kyle Collina was dominant on the hill, tossing a two-hit, complete game shutout in the one-nothing Lehigh victory. Collina struck out seven and did not yield a walk in the win, which improves his record to 4-4 on the season.
Scoreless in the top of the seventh, the Mountain Hawks took advantage of a Crusaders’ miscue to score the game’s only run. With two away and nobody aboard, catcher Matt Capell reached on an error. After pinch runner Jon Andres stole second base, center fielder Joe Ercolano singled through the right side, plating Andres with the only score of the game.
Offensively, Lehigh scratched out four singles – including two from Ercolano – in the game one triumph.
In game two, the Mountain Hawks rallied from a 5-2 deficit for the come-from-behind 8-6 win. In the top of the fifth, first baseman Forrest Doane smacked a two-run homer to right field to cut the Holy Cross lead to 5-4.
Tied at 5-5 in the seventh inning, the Mountain Hawks used back-to-back hits from Doane and left fielder Andrew Smith to take the lead for good.
Leading 7-6 in the ninth, Doane crushed his second homer of the game and eighth of the season – a solo shot to right – to give Lehigh the two run victory.
Freshman Andrew Grim hurled four scoreless innings of relief to improve his record to 2-0. Junior John Zaszewski pitched the game’s final two innings to earn his first save of the season.
“We really gutted it out in the second game, and we got solid performance from Andrew Grim in relief,” Leary explained. Forrest Doane had a monster game for us as well.”
With the pair of losses, Holy Cross falls to 10-15 overall and 3-5 in league play this season.
The Mountain Hawks return to the diamond on Tuesday, when Lehigh plays host to
Photo (c) 2005, Chris Christian/Lehigh Athletics.
