UB Baseball Opens 2013 ECC Championship Tournament With Win Over Top-Seeded St. Thomas Aquinas

Brookhaven, N.Y.-The number four seed, University of Bridgeport Purple Knights scored three runs in the sixth inning and four runs in the eighth inning and withstood a furious rally by the top-seeded St. Thomas Aquinas College Spartans, who plated two runs and left the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth inning, as UB posted a 7-3 win over STAC in the opening round of the 2013.  Bridgeport will now face Molloy, which defeated Dowling 6-0, in a winner's bracket game at 12 noon tomorrow, and St. Thomas Aquinas will play in an elimination game against Dowling at 9:00 a.m. on Friday.  All games in the 2013 ECC Baseball championship are being hosted at Dowling College.  With the victory, the Purple Knights are now 21-24 on the year, and STAC slips to 35-12.

Junior, lead-off batter Brock Roggie (Lowville, N.Y.) led the Bridgeport offensive attack going 3-for-5 at the plate with two runs batted.  Classmate Jesse Solar (Marlton, N.J.) went 2-for-3 with an RBI.

Junior John Ascenzia (West Haven, Conn.) gave UB a 2-1 lead which they never relinquished in the sixth, and freshman Nick Zieniuk (Margate, N.J.) and senior T.J. Mangan (Bronx, N.Y.) knocked in the Purple Knights other runs.  Mangan got his RBI on a perfect squeeze bunt.

On the mound for the Purple Knights, senior Shaun Hancock (Oakville, Ont., Canada) started and worked 8.2 innings in which he allowed nine hits, three runs (all earned) with four strike outs and two walks.  Senior Garrett Rogers (Rennselear, N.Y.) recorded the last out of the game on a fly ball to get the Purple Knights out of the bases-loaded jam in the bottom of the ninth and notch his first save of 2013.

Robert Frank took the loss for St. Thomas Aquinas, and Frank Salerno, Stanley Susana and Rich Baerga drove in runs for the Spartans.