Framingham, MA --- The Framingham State University baseball team was defeated twice today by Worcester State in Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference (MASCAC) action at Framingham's Bowditch Field. The Lancers won the opening game 7-4 and took the second by a score of 3-1.
The Rams fall to 12-15 overall on the year and 3-5 in the MASCAC, while the Lancers improve to 17-9 overall and 5-3 in conference. The Blue and Gold are now tied for second in the MASCAC with Salem State, who lost to Westfield twice earlier this afternoon.
Senior Corey McDonald (Hudson, MA) led off game one with a solo homerun to center field off FSU starting pitcher Matthew DiCato (Winthrop, MA) giving the Lancers the early 1-0 lead.
The Lancers added two more in the second on a two out, two RBI single from sophomore Adam Metzger (Northampton, MA) and one in the third on fourth-year Nick Fluegge's (Ware, MA) solo homerun to left to extend their lead to 4-0.
Sophomore Nick Gezotis (Westfield, MA) helped build up the Lancer lead to 5-0 in the fifth with an RBI single that plated McDonald.
The Rams got two back in the bottom of the fifth as junior Chris Brassard (Fitchburg, MA) led off the inning with a double to center and came around to score on classmate Chris Blydell's (Lynn, MA) double to right center. Senior Corey Ketterer (Plymouth, MA) drove in Blydell with an RBI single to left center.
Senior Paul Rodriguez (San Antonio, TX) drove in the final two Lancers runs in the game in the top of the seventh on his single up the middle.
The Rams added two more in the bottom of the seventh to reach the final score of 7-4 to touch up sophomore closer Shaun Slattery (Gardner, MA) for his third and fourth earned runs this season. ophomore Justin Forman (Watertown, MA) drove in a run with a single up the middle and senior Danny Tomasz (Newburyport, MA) drove in the other with a sacrifice fly to right.
Senior Bobby DeVito (Webster, MA) earned the win for the Lancers tossing fiving innings and allowing two runs, both earned, on five hits with three strikeouts and six walks. DeVito (3-1) is now an impressive 15-3 in his four-year career at Worcester State. Slattery earned his fifth save of the season in the opening game.
DiCato (4-1) was tagged with the loss surrendering five earned runs on eight hits in 4.2 innings of work.
Game two was a pitcher's duel between WSU junior starter Cruz Rosado (Clinton, MA) and FSU starting pitcher senior Matthew Magazine (Marlboro, MA).
Cruz (2-1) went the distance picking up his second win of the season allowing one earned run on three hits with four strikeouts and no walks on 89 total pitches. Magazine tossed a complete game as well and picked up the loss allowing three runs, two earned, on five hits with a pair of walks and five strikeouts.
Worcester State broke a scoreless tie in the top of the fourth inning as they capitalized on a pair of Rams throwing errors to score an unearned run and take a 1-0 lead.
The Rams tied the game in the bottom of the inning as Sean Callahan (Watertown, MA) drove in a run on an RBI groundout.
Worcester pushed across what would be the game-winning run in the sixth as Gezotis doubled and scored on an RBI single by Fluegge with two outs. The Lancers added an insurance run in the top of the seventh on McDonald's second solo homerun of the day and Cruz retired the Rams in order in the bottom of the inning to record the win.
The Rams return to action on Wednesday as they travel to Elms College at 7:30 while the Lancers host Becker on Thursday at 4 PM.
Release Courtesy of Framingham State Sports Information