POUGHKEEPSIE, NY - The Iona College baseball team dropped the series finale to Marist 7-0, on Sunday afternoon at McCann Baseball Field. With Iona's offense not able to manufacture a run,
Joey Kasper worked six strong innings on the mound to keep the Gaels close but four runs in the home half of the eighth, proved to be the final nail in the coffin.
GAME SUMMARY
After surrendering a run in the first, Kasper bounced back, retiring the next six of the seven batters he faced during the course of the second and third inning. Kasper picked up three of his four strikeouts during this stretch and he now currently sits at 33 strikeouts on the year which is second most on the team and leads all freshmen.
Iona had its best opportunity to score in the second, after singles from
Brad Polinsky and
Jim Kemp but the Red Foxes escaped the jam with an inning-ending fly-out to keep Iona off the board.
Marist added to the lead in the fourth, using an RBI triple from Brian Hart and during the ensuing at-bat, another run came in to score on a wild pitch, extending the lead to 3-0. With only one-out and two runners still on, Kasper got an inning ending double play to escape any further damage and keep the deficit at three runs.
With the bases-loaded in the fifth, Marist had another opportunity to add to the lead but Nick Carnveale made a nice play at third to throw out a runner at the plate for the second out of the inning. Kasper got the following batter to ground out to work himself out of trouble and pitch a scoreless fifth inning.
 Kasper went on to retire Mairst in order in the sixth and after facing two batters in the seventh, his afternoon outing was finished. Kasper's 6.1 innings of work, is the longest outing during his impressive freshman campaign for the Gaels.
Vicente Mendoza came in relief, and picked up a strikeout along with a fly-out to keep Marist off the board for the third straight inning. Unfortunately Marist starting pitcher Alex Pansini did a good job limiting Iona's chances at the plate all afternoon and after working around a leadoff single from Canrvale, Pansini got three-straight outs to complete his eight inning outing.
Marist put together its best inning at the plate in the eighth, adding four runs to create some insurance. Marist took advantage of two errors committed by the Gaels that allowed two-runs to score and the Red Foxes provided the final dagger on a two-run homer to go up 7-0 and would end up being the final score from McCann Baseball Field.
UP NEXT
The Gaels will travel to Hempstead for a non-conference matchup against Hofstra on Tuesday May 3rd at 3:00 PM.
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