Box Score
LANTANA, FL—NJIT led by three runs early, fell behind by five, came back to tie the score in the top of the eighth inning, but ultimately lost on a pair of runs in the bottom of the eighth and Long Island University edged the Highlanders, 13-11, Tuesday afternoon in Palm Beach Challenge baseball action.
Both pitchers of record were relievers, as RHP John Slootmaker, the fourth of LIU's five pitchers, got the win with 1.1 innings of scoreless relief, while the NJIT's second pitcher, freshman RHP Reid Okita took the loss, working four innings. The decisions were the first of the year for each pitcher.
Sophomore Gerard Tingos posted a save for the Blackbirds, moving to the mound from second base to record the final out after the Highlanders put two men on base with two out in the ninth inning.
The Highlanders continued to show improvement at the plate, banging out a season-best 15 hits in their first game in warm Florida. NJIT had struggled at the plate through the first six games (all against Big East opponents) and then eked out a 2-1 win over Iona, the first non-Big East foe on the slate. However, the team got 12 hits in a 5-4 extra-inning loss to Northeastern on Sunday and followed with the 15 hits and a season-high 11 runs against LIU.
Nine different Highlanders hit safely against the Blackbirds and three different NJIT players got three hits each. Senior 1B PJ Saporito, who had been hitting the ball hard without the desired results, broke out in a big way on Tuesday, going 3-for-5, with two runs scored and four batted in.
Freshman 3B Dan Moreno was 3-for-6, including a grand slam that tied the score for NJIT in the top of the eighth inning. He raised his season average to .313 (10-32) and now leads NJIT with two home runs and eight RBI.
Senior 2B Craig Binkiewicz, batting leadoff, was 3-for-5 and scored a team-leading three runs. His season average is up to .387.
Six other Highlanders got one hit apiece, including freshman LF Jeffrey Pizzi and sophomore CF James D'Aloia, each of whom hit doubles. Pizzi drove in two runs.
LIU, which had two games in Florida before facing NJIT, got 15 hits of its own against the Highlanders, including a double and three home runs. One of the homers, a two-run shot by junior C Chris Kievit in the bottom of the eighth inning, proved decisive, sending the 12th and 13th Blackbird runs across the plate after the Highlanders had tied the score with five runs in the top half of the inning.
Senior CF Frank DiMasi was the big man for Long Island up to that point, finishing 4-for-5, with four RBI and a home run of his own. He had doubled leading off the Blackbird eighth in front of Kievit and scored what proved to be the winning run. Leadoff hitter LF James Jones also homered and was one of four Blackbirds to finish the game with two hits.
Defensive mistakes played a role in the scoring for both teams, as they combined for six errors, three passed balls and a balk. In all, LIU scored five unearned runs and one NJIT run was unearned.
Saporito drove home Binkiewicz with the first run of the game in the top of the first, before NJIT got its unearned run for a 2-0 lead that was erased in the bottom of the frame. Jones led off with a home run and LIU added two more runs for a 3-2 lead through one inning.
The Highlanders then surged ahead with four runs in the top of the second that began with a leadoff double by D'Aloia, who soon scored on Pizzi's two-run double. Saporito also had a single that drove in two runs in the inning.
NJIT's second lead was short-lived, too, as LIU got a run back in the bottom of the second and then went on top thanks to a four-run bottom of the third that gave the Blackbirds an 8-6 advantage. DiMasi homered for his team's last two runs of the third inning.
The Highlanders, who had put six runs on the board in the first two innings, went scoreless from the third through the seventh innings. Meanwhile, Long Island, which has played four games in which both teams reached double-figure scoring totals, tacked on a run in the fourth inning and two in the fifth for an 11-6 lead that stuck until the top of the eighth.
Binkiewicz began the game-tying rally with a double and scored two batters later on another Saporito single. DH Matt Tomczyk followed Saporito with a walk, loading the bases for Moreno, who knotted the score with his grand slam to left field.
Okita, the NJIT freshman reliever, had allowed three runs (two earned) combined in the fourth and the fifth innings, but he had quieted the Blackbirds, blanking them on one hit over the next two innings.
Having started his fifth inning of work, Okita left after allowing a double to DiMasi leading off the bottom of the eighth inning. Senior LHP Matt Melody, who started two of NJIT's first six games, then came on for his first relief outing of the year and Kievit met him with a two-run home to center field. Melody then struck out the next two batters and got a ground out to end the inning,
After two were out in the top of the ninth, Saporito and Tomczyk walked, but they were left on base when LIU's Tingos got the save by inducing a fielder's choice grounder to shortstop to end the game.
The Highlanders, with no game scheduled on Wednesday, will face UMBC in a 2 pm game on Thursday.
