PITTSBURGH, Pa. (April 21, 2011) – The Rutgers baseball team dropped a doubleheader to Pittsburgh Thursday at Charles L. Cost Field in Pittsburgh, Pa. With rain scheduled to enter the area over the weekend, the Scarlet Knights (14-21, 6-8 BIG EAST) and Panthers (24-13, 10-4 BIG EAST) played a doubleheader Thursday. Despite a pair of solid pitching performances from Tyler Gebler (Toms River, N.J.) and Rob Smorol (Clark, N.J.), RU dropped the series opener to Pitt, 4-0, and fell in the nightcap, 3-0.
Pittsburgh put together a two-out rally in the second inning of Thursday’s series opener to push across two runs when Zach Duggan singled home a run down the line in left and an error allowed a second run to score on the play.
Gebler rebounded from the two-run second inning as the sophomore did not allow another hit until the sixth. Duggan delivered again for the Panthers in the sixth frame with an RBI single to the gap in left-center field to cap another two-run inning and build Pitt’s lead to 4-0.
The Scarlet Knights could not push across a run in the contest as Pittsburgh starter Matt Iannazzo posted the complete-game shutout with four strikeouts and five hits allowed to earn the win and improve to 5-2 for the season. Gebler (2-4) struck out three and allowed four runs on five hits over six innings of work. Junior Willie Beard (Spotswood, N.J.) came in to work scoreless seventh and eighth frames for the Scarlet Knights.
The bottom third of the Rutgers lineup – Brandon Boykin (Teaneck, N.J.), Jeff Melillo (Annandale, N.J.) and Pat Sweeney (Sparta, N.J.) – accounted for three of the Scarlet Knights’ five hits in the contest.
Rutgers got another solid pitching effort out of Smorol (3-5) in the nightcap as the sophomore went the distance in the 3-0 loss. He struck out three and allowed the three runs on six hits in the hard-luck loss. His counterpart, Corey Baker, struck out five in seven scoreless innings of work with just four hits allowed in the contest to earn the victory and improve to 4-1 for the season.
Travis Whitmore opened the third with a double to center field and came around to score with one out later in the frame on a Duggan groundout as the Panther collected his third RBI of the day.
A Casey Roche RBI single in the seventh and a John Shultz RBI double to the gap in left-center field in the eighth gave the Panthers the 3-0 advantage.
The Scarlet Knights’ best scoring opportunity in the nightcap occurred in the fourth inning when senior Michael Lang (Dumont, N.J.) was hit with one out in the frame and moved all the way over to third with two outs but Baker got an inning-ending strikeout to preserve the shutout. Baker allowed just one hit after the fourth inning en route to the victory.
Lang and junior Russ Hopkins (Piscataway, N.J.) were the lone Scarlet Knights to collect a hit in each contest on Thursday with each individual recording a pair of singles for the day.
Rutgers and Pittsburgh will close the series with a 3 p.m. game Friday. Rain is expected in the Pittsburgh area on Friday and should the teams not be able to play the scheduled 3 p.m. game, the series will conclude Saturday with a noon contest. Junior righty Nathaniel Roe (Plainfield, N.J.) will be on the mound for the Scarlet Knights against freshman righty Ethan Mildren for the Panthers in the series finale.
