Baseball’s season ends with 8-7 loss in 11 innings to F&M

COLLEGEVILLE, Pa. – The Haverford College baseball team saw its season end with an 8-7 loss to Franklin & Marshall College on Saturday morning in the Centennial Conference championships. Haverford climbed back from a 5-1 deficit to take a 7-5 lead heading into the ninth. Franklin & Marshall tied it up with a two-run homer in the ninth and scored the winning run on a wild pitch.

Both teams scored runs in the first inning, but Franklin & Marshall (23-14-1) scored a run with two outs in the bottom of the second on a Haverford (17-17-1) throwing error to take the lead, 2-1.

F&M scored one in the fourth on a ground out and two runs in the fifth on sacrifice flies to put the Diplomats ahead, 5-1. The Fords bats came alive as a three-run sixth got them back in the game. Charlie Carluccio singled in Dean Laganosky for the first run. Jeff Butera followed with a triple to right field that plated Carluccio. With one out Evan Tibbetts grounded out to short, scoring Butera to pull HC within a run.

After a shaky start to the game Stefan Pappius-Lefebvre settled in nicely and held the F&M offense at bay for the next three innings. That allowed the Fords to tie the score in the seventh and take the lead in the eighth.

Louis DeRosa drew a lead off walk in the seventh. He stole second and advanced to third on a wild pitch. Pinch-hitter Robbie Crabtree’s infield single brought home DeRosa for the tying run. After Crabtree was thrown out trying to steal second, Diplomats starter Brian Andres got Laganosky and Carluccio to ground out to end the inning.

Butera reach on an infield single and moved up to second on a wild pitch to start the eighth. He advanced to third on a sacrifice bunt by Jeremy Zoll and once again Tibbetts did the job, grounding out to short, to put the Fords ahead, 6-5.

DeRosa crushed a solo homer to left center field off reliever Brendan McCreary to give HC some breathing room in the ninth. In the bottom of the inning Matt Will led off with a single. Pappius-Lefebvre got Andrew Hanson to go down swinging for the first out, but Shea Moriarty homered to left to tie the score at 7-7 and send the game into extra innings.

Neither team had a serious threat in the 10th. Haverford got the go-ahead run to second with one out in the 11th, but Matt Metsch (4-2) induced a double play ball to end the inning.

Hanson singled off Carluccio (1-1) with one out in the bottom of the 11th. After Moriarty walked Jason Anderson advanced the runners to second and third with a bunt. With a 2-0 count on Nick Rolnick a wild pitch allowed Hanson to score the winning run.

DeRosa and Butera both went 4-for-5 on the day. DeRosa scored three runs while Butera scored twice.