St. John's University Athletics
St. Johns Falls to Princeton, 7-4
4/29/2003 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
Princeton starter Erik Stiller went six innings, yielding three runs on six hits, and struck out eight batters as he improved to 1-3 this season. James Vaughan allowed one run in two innings and Brian Biegen retired the side in order in the ninth to close out the game.
St. Johns had jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the third when sophomore catcher Marc Wagner (Philadelphia, Pa.) hit his first career home run, a two-run blast to left, scoring freshman Greg Thomson (Levittown, N.Y.), who reached on a one-out single.
Graduate student Greg Holmes (Stony Brook, N.Y.) started for the Red Storm and was solid through three innings. He got into trouble in the second, walking Tim Lahey to lead off the inning and allowing a single to Ryan Reich to put runners on the corners, but induced Stephen Wendell to ground into an inning-ending double play.
In the fourth, however, Princeton jumped on top for good. B.J. Szymanski led off the inning by legging out an infield single and he moved to third base on a single from Jon Miller. The next pitch was wild and it brought Szymanski home and moved Miller to second base. Lahey then came up and put Princeton ahead with his 11th home run of the season, a two-run shot that cleared the fence in right-center, the second time in as many years he has hit one to that area.
Will Venable then laced a double along the left field line and scored when Reich singled through the right side and advanced to second on the throw. Mike Chernoff then hit an infield single that did not advance Reich. With runners on first and second, Becker came to bat and hit a double to dead center that landed at the foot of the wall and cleared the bases scoring both runs.
St. Johns added additional runs in the sixth and eighth innings but could not draw even with the Tigers. In the sixth, junior Mike Rozema (Fair Lawn, N.J.) reached on a bunt single, stole second, moved to third on a throwing error and scored when sophomore Jim Martin (Norwood, Mass.) singled through the right side, making it a 6-3 game. In the eighth, the Red Storm pulled to within two when Rozema hit a leadoff double, moved to third on a fly out and scored when freshman Eddie Schultz (Flemington, N.J.) hit a sacrifice fly to right.
Princeton added an insurance run in the ninth when Eric Fitzgerald hit a solo home run to right.
St. Johns wraps up its eight-game homestand with a matchup on Thursday against LIU. First pitch is slated for 7 p.m.