With less than a month to go before the start of the Northeast Conference Baseball Championships, the defending champion Monmouth University Hawks need to put all of the pieces together in a hurry.
With just the top four teams (based on regular-season conference winning percentage) qualifying for the double-elimination tournament, Monmouth finds itself on the outside looking in heading into the week. At 10-10 in conference play (16-18 overall), MU is tied with Central Connecticut State for fifth place, trailing Bryant and Wagner (both 11-5) and Sacred Heart and Quinnipiac (both 9-7).
Fortunately for head coach Dean Ehehalt’s club, they will have the opportunity to make up some ground over the next two weeks with games against both Quinnipiac and Sacred Heart. Quinnipiac comes to West Long Branch this weekend for a fourgame series, including a doubleheader on Saturday. Then, following a single game against James Madison next Wednesday, the Hawks will travel to Stamford, Conn., on Thursday to start a three-game series with the Pioneers.
From there, the Hawks will close out the regular season with a four-game series with a struggling Fairleigh Dickinson, but Ehehalt is hopeful that his team will have wrapped up its NEC berth by then and will be playing for a higher seed.
While their play over the next two weeks will make or break their season, the Hawks certainly gained some momentum this past weekend by taking three out of four from Long Island University. The strong showing effectively kept the Hawks in the running for one of the four coveted spots in the NEC tourney, while likely ending the Blackbirds’ hopes of reaching the postseason, dropping their conference record to 7-13 on the year.
In game one on Friday, Bobby Dombrowski continued to show why he is among the NEC’s top run producers, blasting a pair of home runs to pace a 9- 2 win. Nick Meyers (East Brunswick) was strong on the hill once again, tossing a season-high eight strong innings, allowing just two runs on four hits.
But it was Dombrowski who stole the spotlight. His first blast came in the fourth inning when he followed a Mike Casale lead-off single with a two-run shot to right off LIU starter Kenny Cedel that gave the Hawks a 3-0 lead. LIU trimmed it to 3-2 in the fifth when Gerard Tingos touched up Meyers for a two-run home run of his own.
Monmouth then blew the game open in the seventh with back-to-back two-run doubles from Ryan Terry and Jamie Rosenkranz (Ocean Township) to go ahead, 7-2. Dombrowski then capped the scoring in the top of the eighth with a two-run shot that followed a Casale leadoff double.
On Saturday, Monmouth’s offense picked up right where it left off, rallying for a 9-7 win in game one. However, the bats went silent in the nightcap as LIU posted a 2-0 win behind a brilliant onehit, 12-strikeout performance from freshman Justin Topa.
Game one was a real slugfest, with MU needing to post a late rally, scoring seven runs over the last two innings to pull out the win. LIU jumped out to a 4- 0 lead early on off MU starter Kyle Breese (South Brunswick), but Monmouth cut the lead in half when Terry led off with a double (his team-leading 13th of the year) and scored on a Nick Pulsonetti groundout.
Pulsonetti then crossed the plate following consecutive LIU fielding errors.
Up 4-2 in the bottom of the fifth, LIU scored three runs, getting the first on a passed ball and the next two on back-toback round-trippers from Drew Walsh and Derek Stupski.
Down 7-2, MU went to work in the top of the sixth. Terry and Pulsonetti led off with singles before Casale stroked an RBI single to plate the first run. Dombrowski then followed with an RBI double and scored on a Danny Avella groundout to cut the lead to 7-5.
Reliever Nick McNamara managed to hold the Blackbirds at bay in the bottom of the inning (stranding the bases loaded), allowing the Hawks to take the lead in the seventh. Rosenkranz tied the score with a bases-loaded two-run single, and then MU took the lead when the goahead run scored on a sac fly from Dombrowski. Rosenkranz then stole third and scored the game’s final run on a throwing error.
McNamara was able to seal the deal in relief and got the win for his efforts, allowing no runs over two innings of work. Terry led the way offensively, going 3-for-4 with three runs scored, while Dombrowski continued to impress with another 3-RBI effort.
In game two, LIU touched up MU starter Pat Light (Colts Neck/CBA) for runs in the first and second innings, and that was all Topa would need. Dombrowski’s infield single in the fifth was the only hit Topa would surrender, while Light (1-5) was the hard-luck loser, going six innings and allowing just the two runs on four hits with seven strikeouts.
With the split on Saturday, Sunday’s game became even more meaningful, and thanks to the efforts of Terry, the Hawks managed to pull out the important win. Terry blasted his team-leading sixth and seventh home runs and had five RBIs on the day, while Rosenkranz kept his bat hot with a 4-for-5 day and Dombrowski chipped in with two hits.
Terry’s first blast gave the Hawks a 2- 0 lead in the top of the third inning, but LIU cut the lead in half with a run in the bottom half of the inning. MU then added two runs in the top of the seventh when Terry tripled to center and scored on an error and Pulsonetti followed with an RBI single, scoring Rosenkranz.
LIU added two runs in the bottom of the seventh on a sac fly and an RBI single from Greg DeSantis to get within 4-3, but Monmouth got both runs back when Terry launched his second dinger of the game in the eighth — a three-run shot to left center.
The Blackbirds touched up freshman Neil Harm for a pair of runs in the bottom of the eighth to get within 7-5, but McNamara came in in relief to shut the door and pick up his first save of the season.
M
onmouth’s offense seems to be
rounding into form, led by Dombrowski, who is 10th in the league in batting average (.351, 39-11) and is also among the league leaders in RBIs with 28. Casale is also hitting for a high average (.346, 36- 104), while Terry is among the league leaders in runs scored with 33. Still, MU has the lowest team batting average in the NEC (.269), although they are fifth in runs scored (197). That means that they’re making their hits count, which they will certainly need to do over the next two weeks against Quinnipiac and Sacred Heart — two of the better offensive teams in the NEC. Sacred Heart in particular has a lot of firepower, hitting .306 as a team.
Monmouth’s pitching has been solid, with the staff pitching to an ERA of slightly under 6.00 — good enough for third in the conference — and holding the opposition to a .290 batting average. Meyers leads the team with four wins and a 3.28 ERA (good enough for third in the NEC) and has the league’s lowest batting average-against (.207). Breese has also been solid, pitching to a 4.06 ERA.
The Hawks will need their pitching to hold up down the stretch. And should they qualify for the NEC Tournament, the staff is sure to be tested, with the Hawks playing as many as seven games over the three-day tournament.