By Rob Pelaez -- STAFF WRITER On Saturday, the Hofstra baseball team took a trip down to Latham Park in Elon, North Carolina to kick off a three game series with the Phoenix. The Pride, entering the series at 13-25, suffered a game one loss to Elon by the score of 14-8.
Hofstra pitcher Chris Weiss suffered his fourth loss of the year, only able to last 2.2 innings and giving up 12 runs on 11 hits.
After the Pride jumped out to an early 1-0 lead in the first, courtesy of a home run from sophomore Mat Annunziata, the Elon bats came out in full swing in the bottom frame, scoring a whopping six runs off Weiss.
An onslaught of hits and six more runs followed the next two innings, as Elon increased their lead to 12-3, after a Ryan Karl solo homer in the second, and a Friscia RBI double in the third. The Pride were able to make more of a dent in the Elon lead thanks to a Foster RBI single followed by another Annunziata home run in the seventh, but Hofstra was not able to rebound in game one of the doubleheader.
For the Pride, the loss dropped them to 13-25 on the year, and 4-8 in CAA play. However, there were certainly some bright spots of promise for this young squad filled with talent and potential. While the Hofstra defense was not at its finest, the offense was still able to generate some force.
Annunziata’s two homer, three RBI outing was one of his best performances of the year, going 2-5 at the plate, and bumped his average up to .280 on the season with seven home runs and a team leading 34 RBIs to go along with it. Center field sophomore Steven Foster also had a 2-5 day at the dish to go along with his 12th and 13th RBIs on the year, as well as extending his streak of games played and started to an even 40-40.
For Weiss, his ERA spiked up to 7.56, but was still able to produce four strikeouts, en route to his 30th on the year.
After the series at Elon, Hofstra will have a one game homestead on Tuesday, April 26 taking on St. John’s before a pivotal three game series with conference rivals UNC Wilmington.
After their 5-0 week prior to this, with wins over Manhattan College, a three game sweep over College of Charleston, and a 12-6 win over LIU Brooklyn, Hofstra has to get back on the winning track in order to aim for a close to .500 (win percentage) finish, with just 13 games to play. However, with a young core group of hitters with promise, the sky can be the limit for this team moving forward.