May 17, 2002
Box Score
Fishkill, NY - The Marist College baseball team split a Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC) double-header with Iona College, dropping the first game 5-3, before rebounding to win the nightcap 15-3, this evening at Dutchess Stadium. Marist finishes the regular season at 37-12 overall and 22-5 in MAAC play, good for the MAAC Regular Season Championship. The Red Foxes won all nine three-game MAAC regular season series this spring, sweeping four opponents in all three contests.
Chuck Bechtel pitched six strong innings for the Red Foes to improve to 8-4 on the year, allowing just two runs in the second game of the afternoon. He struck out three batters, while allowing just six base hits. Ryan Kondratowicz struck out two batters and allowed an unearned run on three hits in three innings of work to pick up his first save of the year.
The Red Foxes laced out 14 hits to scored 15 runs in the game two victory, led by the 4-5 effort of Mike Sidoti. Sidoti drove in two runs and scored four of his own in the game. Tim Allen was 2-4 with three RBI and a run scored in the victory. Marist scored three times in the second, to take a 3-2 lead, put up two in the third and blew the game open with four in the home half of the fifth inning. The Red Foxes added one in the seventh and five in the eighth before giving up a run in the ninth for the final tally.
In the opener Marist out hit the Gaels 7-4, but committed four errors, which led to three unearned runs. Iona took a4-0 lead in the top of the third but a two-run homer from Anthony Bocchino in the bottom of the inning cut the lead in half. The Red Foxes got within one in the fourth inning when Ben Cueto led off with a double on scored on a wild pitch. Marist put runners on first and second with nobody out in the sixth inning, trailing 5-3, but could not score.
Brad Cook tossed two perfect innings of relied, striking out three, for Marist.
Allen had a hot afternoon going 4-7 with three RBI and a run scored, including three doubles. Jimmy Willis was 1-5 with three RBI and a run scored and Matt Griffiths was 2-7 with three RBI on the day.
Marist will return to action on May 23rd in the first round of the MAAC tournament, in a game to be played at 7:00 pm at Dutchess Stadium. The Red Foxes will play either Rider or Manhattan in that game, with Rider needing to win one of its final two games with St. Peter's or to have Manhattan lose to Fairfield, to earn the number four seed. Siena, who took two of three from LeMoyne this weekend, is the three seed and will paly the Dolphins, the second seed, at 3:00 pm on Thursday.
