Box Score


Camden, NJ … The College of New Jersey baseball team tallied runs in four consecutive innings to complete a home-and-home sweep, defeating Rutgers University-Camden 10-6 on Friday afternoon.
 
Trailing 2-0 entering the second inning, the Lions (17-12, 5-3) scored four runs in the second, two in the third, a pair in the fourth, and two more in the fifth to build a 10-2 lead. The victory lifted TCNJ into a third-place tie in the New Jersey Athletic Conference with William Paterson University. The Lions square off against the Pioneers (21-7, 5-3) tomorrow in a doubleheader in Wayne, NJ.
 
Junior Michael Murphy (Staten Island, NY/Staten Island Tech) went three-for-five for the second straight day and scored two runs. Senior Ed Zakrzewski (Three Bridges, NJ/Hunterdon Central) was clutch at the plate, producing a single, double, and three runs batted in.
 
Junior Robert Schneider (Twp. of Washington, NJ/Westwood) coasted to his third win of the season. He pitched six innings and struck out four to move to 3-0 in four starts. Freshman Tim Wolf (Pennington, NJ/Hopewell Valley) tossed the final three innings out of the bullpen to earn his first collegiate save. He limited the Scarlet Raptors to just one run (unearned) on one hit and struck out three.
 
TCNJ took advantage of some shaky Rutgers-Camden defense and timely hitting to plate four runs in the second. Zakrzewski knocked in the first run with a single through the right side and senior Mike Galeotafiore (Brick, NJ/Christian Brothers Academy) also scored on the play. Sophomore Joe Dispoto (Nutley, NJ/Nutley) drove in his 10^th run of the season with a sacrifice fly and junior Scott Kelly (West Windsor, NJ/West Windsor-North) ripped a double to right-center field to put the Lions ahead 4-2.
 
Zakrzewski stroked a two-out, two-run double in the third inning to stretch the lead to 6-2. TCNJ then strung together three straight singles to open the fourth inning. The final hit of the three off the bat of Jonathan Gabriel (Orefield, PA/Parkland) scored Dispoto, and senior Jimmy Ruzich (Verona, NJ/Montclair Kimberly Academy) drove a pitch to the outfield to score Kelly on a sacrifice fly.
 
Two more runs came in on a hit batsmen and fielder's choice in the fifth inning and it would be all the scoring the Lions would need. Rutgers-Camden would battle back to score runs in the fifth, sixth, and seventh innings, but Wolf gave head coach Dean Glus and pitching staff exactly what it needed out of the bullpen. He was touched for an unearned run in the seventh and pushed forward to eat up the final two frames. Wolf struck out the first two batters he faced in the ninth before getting fly ball to center field to end the game.
 
Dispoto finished with two hits, two runs scored, and an RBI, while Kelly also had two hits, a run scored, and a run batted in. After starting the season with a 13-game hitting streak, Kelly has nearly matched that with a current 12-game streak.
 
Galeotafiore has also hit safely in 10 straight games and now has 196 hits in his career.
 
The Lions continue conference play on tomorrow at William Paterson University. The first game is scheduled for 11:30 a.m.