By Kyle Kandetzki – MANAGING EDITOR With a hard fought win to build off the day before, the Pride nearly went to extras again to decide a non-conference battle, but ended up losing in walk-off fashion.
The Hofstra Pride baseball team fell to the Fairfield Stags 5-4 on Wednesday afternoon. Hofstra and Fairfield entered the bottom of the ninth knotted at four, but Tim Zeng singled home the winning run to give them the victory. Hofstra drops to 6-19 on the season.
The out-of-conference affair was a back-and-forth one, with Hofstra striking first. A Brad Witkowski double brought home Kevin O’Connor, followed by another double by Steven Foster on the very next pitch to make the score 2-0 in favor of Hofstra.
After an 11-inning game vs. NYIT the day before, head coach John Russo treaded lightly with his pitching staff, as no pitcher stayed in for longer than three innings. Teddy Cillis started for Hofstra and threw two innings of shutout ball, allowing just one hit.
It was Alec Eisenberg, who came on in the third, who had to deal with trouble, all of which unfolded in the bottom of the fourth. The Stags put together a four-run rally, despite Hofstra stopping one runner on a throw home.
Fairfield’s Michael Conti singled in two runs with two outs to tie things up, then two more came in shortly after from an error charged to third baseman David Leiderman off the bat of Drew Arciuolo. The latter two runs were marked as unearned, and the Stags went up 4-2.
But Hofstra battled back via a bases loaded walk from Kevin O’Connor in the sixth and a fielder’s choice hit by Mat Annunziata that scored Tom Archer, tying the score at four.
Following Eisenberg’s three innings day, Brendan Mulligan, Dave Jesch and Andrew Mundy combined to shutout Fairfield in the sixth, seventh and eighth with just three hits and two walks combined. But the Hofstra offense could not piece together any more runs following the seventh.
Chris Bonk came on in the ninth to attempt to push his team to extras for a second straight day, but things quickly fell apart. After putting down the first batter on two pitches, Fairfield’s Mac Crispino reached on a walk.
Tyler Gambardella then pinch-ran for Crispino and immediately made an impact. He stole second and then moved up to third on an errant throw from Hofstra catcher Chris Hardardt.
With Gambardella just 90 feet away, Zeng hit his 0-1 pitch to center for the walk-off winner, giving Bonk the loss, dropping him to 1-2.
Hofstra suffered from three errors, despite mostly stellar pitching.
Steven Foster went 3-for-4, while Brad Witkowski and David Leiderman also had multi-hit days.
The Pride now turns back to CAA play as they travel to Maryland for a three-game set with the Towson Tigers April 1-3. Hofstra is 0-2 thus far in-conference.