May 23, 2008
Box Score
Atlantic City, NJ - No. 4 Mount St. Mary's ended No. 3 Wagner's season with a 5-1 victory in the elimination round of the Northeast Conference (NEC) Tournament at Bernie Robbins Stadium. Despite the loss, the Green & White turned in an outstanding season setting school-records for victories (27) and conference-wins (17) while defeating No. 22 St. John's. The future is bright as Wagner loses just three seniors from the team while returning all nine starters in the field and three of its four weekend starters.
The Seahawks end its season with a 27-28 record while the Mountaineers claimed its first-ever NEC Tournament win in improving to 18-32.
After lasting just two-thirds of an inning in his last start against Wagner, Brett Moore struck out four while yielding just one unearned run on three hits over 7.0 innings in improving to 4-7. Mike Matta struck out three over 2.0 scoreless innings of relief for his fourth save of the year.
The Mount took the lead in the top of the first with an unearned run. Matt Eiden singled to lead off the contest. After sophomore Kyle Morrison (Middlesex, NJ / Immaculata) retired the next two batters, Josh Vittek reached on an error. Ryan Murray took advantage of the Wagner-miscue, singling up the middle to plate Eiden and make it 1-0 Mount.
The Mountaineers added two runs in the top of the third when Vittek and Murray hit back-to-back home runs with two outs to extend the lead out to 3-0.
Wagner posted its first threat in the bottom of the third. Sophomore Kevin Payne (Staten Island, NY / St. Peter's) reached on an error to lead off the inning and freshman Seth Boyd (Perth Amboy, NJ / Perth Amboy) drew a four-pitch walk. The pair advanced to second-and-third on freshman Brian Martutartus' (Carlsbad, CA / La Costa Canyon) sacrifice-bunt. However the duo would be stranded as Moore induced a pop-up and a strikeout to quell the threat.
The Mount added to the lead with a run in the fifth. Shane Eyler led off with a single and Drew Counselman followed with a single of his own. Murray then collected his third RBI of the day with a RBI-single to left field.
Wagner finally got on the board in the bottom of the seventh. Freshman Jon Lucas (Hackettstown, NJ / Hackettstown) led off with a hard-hit single to left field. Classmate Jared Gruccio (Landisville, NJ / Buena Regional) pinch-ran for Lucas and was safe on a throwing-error before advancing to third on the error. Junior Chris Drechsel's (Cranford, NJ / Cranford) sacrifice fly to deep-center scored Gruccio to cut the lead to 4-1.
Mount St. Mary's capped the scoring with an unearned run in the top of the ninth.
Morrison struck out six while yielding four runs, three earned, over 4.1 innings in falling to 5-5 on the year. Sophomore Matt Watson (Howell, NJ / Howell) hurled 3.2 innings of scoreless relief for the Green & White.
Drechsel went 1-3 with a RBI to lead the Wagner-offense. Damian Csakai (So., Freehold, NJ / Freehold), Joe Jamison (Fr., West Caldwell, NJ / James Caldwell) and Lucas each added hits for the Green & White.
Wagner graduates seniors Chris Marino (Manalapan, NJ / Manalapan), Dan Morvay (Jackson, NJ / Jackson Memorial), Joe Testa (Brick, NJ / Brick) and student-assistant Mike Tuozzo (Holmdel, NJ / Holmdel) from this year's team. The foursome helped lead the Green & White to a combined 84 wins and three NEC Tournament appearances.
