STORRS, CT - A three-run home run by Connecticut's Josh Farkes with two outs in the seventh inning broke a 4-4 tie, giving the Huskies a 7-4 victory over the Rutgers baseball team Friday afternoon at J.O. Christian Field. 

The fifth-place Scarlet Knights (27-25-1, 13-13 BIG EAST) were in a tight contest with the second-place Huskies (37-16-1, 17-6-1 BIG EAST) before Farkes lifted his third home run in two days over the center-field fence with two outs in seventh the inning to give Connecticut its first lead of the game and the Huskies held on for the victory.  

Rutgers held an early edge in the contest, plating a pair of runs on one swing in the first inning as Ryan Hill (Hillsdale, NJ) drilled a two-run home run - his second in as many games - over the right-field fence.

Connecticut, however, countered with a pair of runs in the bottom-half of the first to tie it up, capitalizing on an RU error to score the final run of the frame. 

Second baseman Mike Bionde (Pompton Plains, NJ) drew a third-inning leadoff walk and Todd Frazier (Toms River, NJ) followed with a two-run, opposite-field home run - his ninth of the season - over the right-field fence to put the Scarlet Knights back on top, 4-3.  

The Huskies, however, tied it back up in the fifth with a two-out bloop single to right field to score a run.

Rutgers had a golden opportunity to re-capture the lead in the sixth with runners on second and third and just one out. However, UConn starting pitcher Rich Sirois got designated hitter Vic Cegles (Phoenix, AZ) to pop out to the shortstop and leadoff man Jeff Grose (Iselin, NJ) to fly out to center field to get the Huskies out of the inning without surrendering a run.   

That set up Farke's heroics in the seventh inning, which proved to be the game-winning shot for Connecticut.

The blast ended Rutgers starter Sean Spicer's (Pearl River, NY) day. He gave up five earned runs (seven total) on 11 hits with a pair of strikeouts in 6.1 innings of work in the loss, falling to 6-4. Reliever Joe Baione (Staten Island, NY) finished out the seventh, before working a scoreless eighth for RU.

Rutgers got one more chance in the ninth with runners on first and third and two outs as Frazier, representing the tying run, stepped to the plate. Husky closer Matt Karl, however, got the shortstop to ground out to second base to end the game.   

Sirois, who had surrendered just two home runs all season, gave up a pair of Scarlet Knight blasts in the first three innings on Friday. He settled down to earn the win and improve to 6-2 on the season, giving up four runs on eight hits with a pair of strikeouts in eight innings of work.     

The start of Friday's game was delayed two hours after heavy rains fell overnight and remained in the area in the morning.

Rutgers will keep an eye on other league games Friday evening to determine where it stands in the conference tournament seeding before wrapping up its series and regular season with Connecticut Saturday at noon at J.O. Christian Field.