ORONO, ME - Evan Gegeckas entered the game with a 4-3 lead in the bottom of the sixth and tossed four scoreless innings out of the bullpen as the NJIT baseball team held off Maine by that same score in the first of a three-game America East Conference series this weekend at Mahaney Diamond.
Both NJIT and Maine entered the weekend 7-2 in America East action, meaning Friday's victory puts the Highlanders in first place in the league as the regular season is now one third of the way finished. NJIT improved to 13-11 overall, while Maine is now 10-14 on the season.
The Highlanders struck first, scoring three runs in the top of the third innings.
Paul Franzoni reached on an error to score the first run, while a two-run triple from
Isiah Daubon made it 3-0 later in the inning.
NJIT added another run in the fourth as
Julio Marcano singled and
Luke Longo came around to score on an error.
Maine was able to solve Highlanders' ace Ryan Fisher, scoring a run in the fourth and two more in the fifth to make things interesting.
Head Coach
Robbie McClellan called on Gegeckas from there and he went the distance en route to his first-career save. Gegeckas struck out the side in the sixth and began the ninth inning with two more strikeouts, as well. After a pair of walks in the ninth, Gegeckas was able to get what appeared to be a clean ground ball to first base. The ball bounced off of
Nick Hussey, but fortunately second baseman
Julio Marcano was backing up and fielded the ball and fired it to Hussey to end the game.
NJIT out-hit Maine 11-4 in Friday's victory, with three of those hits coming from Longo, who also reached via a walk.
David Marcano had a pair of hits to extend his hitting streak to 16 games, a new career high, while Daubon,
Julio Marcano and
Albert Choi also finished with a pair of hits.
Fischer improved to 5-2 on the mound this season and is now 4-0 through four America East starts.
The Highlanders and Black Bears will resume their series on Saturday at 12pm back at Mahaney Diamond in Orono.
