Box Score


NEWARK, NJ—NJIT built early leads of 6-0 and 7-1 and then held on for a 7-6 win over visiting Northern Colorado in the Great West Conference baseball opener for both teams Thursday night at Bears and Eagles Riverfront Stadium.
 
The Highlanders are 8-12 overall, with a season-best three-game winning streak. Losers of their first six one-run decisions in 2012, the last two Highlander victories have been by one run (2-1 at Rider on Tuesday and now 7-6 vs. Northern Colorado).
 
Northern Colorado, which finished second in the first two seasons of Great West Conference baseball in 2010 and 2011, respectively, with a combined conference record of 41-13 those two years, is 9-14 overall after dropping the 2012 GWC opener.
 
Thursday night's win was the first for NJIT in 10 tries against the Bears. In 2010, the first season of GWC play, Northern Colorado swept the four-game regular season series and added a win in the postseason conference tournament. Last year in Colorado, UNC also swept the four-game regular season series.
 
NJIT, which did all of its scoring Thursday in two innings—a six-run second inning and a one-run third inning—got two runs batted in apiece from junior RF DJ Roche(4-for-5) and senior C Bryan Bleakley (2-for-3, including a double and a home run), and one RBI each from senior LF James D'Aloia (2-for-4), senior DH Anthony Caiola, and junior 3B Jeff Peterson.
 
Aside from Bleakley's double and homer, NJIT received doubles from Roche and Peterson.
 
Starting pitcher Mark Leiter, Jr. worked 6.1 innings, allowing seven hits and five runs, while striking out eight and walking one to register the win for the Highlanders. He is 3-4 on the year.
 
Freshman RHP Bill VanMeerbeke earned his first college save, pitching the last 2.2 innings and allowing one run on one hit, with five strikeouts and two walks.
 
While the two NJIT pitchers combined for 13 strikeouts in nine innings, the three Northern Colorado pitchers did them one better, combining for 14 strikeouts in eight innings.
 
The starter and losing pitcher for the Bears, senior LHP Nate Steinmetz (1-4) lasted just 5.1 innings, but 11 of the 16 outs he registered came by way of strikeout.
 
Sophomore RHP Josh Tinnon struck out one and walked one without allowing a hit in 1.1 innings and senior LHP Cameron Tallman allowed a hit and two walks, but not a run, in 1.1 innings, while fanning two Highlanders.
 
Steinmetz was charged with 11 hits, seven runs (four earned) and did not have a walk to go with his 11 Ks.
 
Northern Colorado collected eight hits in the game, led by SS Adam Hilker and C Derek Baum, with two hits apiece. Hilker drove in three runs and 2B Ryan Yamane (1-for-3) added two runs batted in for the Bears. Yamane and 1B Casey Coy (1-for-5) had doubles for the visitors, while Baum stroked a triple.
 
Steinmetz notched three strikeouts looking in the opening inning, but the second frame did not go anywhere near as well for him, as the Highlanders put six runs (four earned) on the board on five hits, aided by two Bears errors.
 
Freshman CF Ed Charlton got things started with a leadoff single and he motored to third when 1B Tom Bouck singled through the right side. Bleakley followed with a double into the right center field gap, scoring Charlton easily with the first run of the game.
 
Caiola's ground out up the middle made it 2-0, before Northern Colorado made errors on back-to-back plays, allowing another run to score. Matt Weckerle was hit by a pitch, loading the bases, and D'Aloia followed with a run-scoring single and Roche singled home two more runs before Steinmetz fanned Charlton and Bouck, the 10th and 11th batters of the frame, to end the inning.
 
Northern Colorado got on the board with a run in the top of the third. Baum, the number eight hitter, led off with a single, went to second on a wild pitch, to third on a passed ball and then scored on Yamane's one-out double. Leiter then struck out the next two batters.
 
The Highlanders got the run back quickly, however, when Bleakley homered to center field leading off the bottom of the third inning, making it 7-1 before Steinmetz had recorded an out in the third inning.
 
But that would be the end of the scoring for NJIT, which needed clutch pitching from Leiter and VanMeerbeke to gain the win.
 
After a scoreless fourth, the Bears drew closer in the fifth inning, scoring three times and trimming NJIT's lead to 7-4. DH Colby Harrison led off with a single and Baum followed with a deep fly ball that turned into an RBI triple when Charlton, the NJIT center fielder, lost his footing as he tracked the ball off of Baum's bat. Baum scored on a ground out by Yamane and the Bears' third run of the inning came around on a single for Hilker, driving home 1B Casey Coy, who had doubled. 
 
Northern Colorado inched closer yet with two runs in the top of the seventh inning. After an out, CF Dylan Banach dropped down a bunt single. With Leiter's pitch count mounting, NJIT coach Mike Cole called VanMeerbeke in from the bullpen and he walked his first batter, Yamane pushing Banach to second.
 
VanMeerbeke struck out Coy for the second out, but both runners stole successfully on strike three. Hilker then singled up the middle against VanMeerbeke to drive home two runs with two outs before VanMeerbeke got Adrian Schenk for the third out. That sequence—Hilker's clutch hit followed by the Schenk out, would play a big role at the end of the game two innings later.
 
The top of the ninth was suspenseful for VanMeerbeke, who preserved the one-run lead to earn his first college save.
 
He struck out pinch hitter Tyler Anderson leading off the frame, but strike three, a low and away pitch, eluded the catcher, Bleakley, for a passed ball, as Anderson beat the throw at first base. Yamane sacrificed Anderson ahead to second base, before VanMeerbeke coaxed a fly out from Coy for the second out.
 
NJIT's coach Cole then opted for an intentional walk to the dangerous Hilker, one of the best hitters in the Great West, who already was 2-for-4 with the three RBI. The move to face Schenk, the UNC cleanup hitter, paid off in spades when he tapped back to the box, where the freshman pitcher fielded and raced across the diamond to step on first for an unassisted out, ending the game.
 
The four-game conference series will continue on Friday with a 1 pm doubleheader at Bears and Eagles Riverfront Stadium.