STATESBORO, Ga. – Rutgers baseball opened its series against Georgia Southern with a 5-2 victory on Friday night.
It was a balanced effort from the Scarlet Knights (5-7), who collected double-digit hits for the third straight game, struck out 13 batters on the mound and played errorless defense to defeat the Eagles (7-7).
Starting pitcher
Drew Conover delivered his third straight quality start and ultimately earned his first win in a Rutgers uniform.
After setting down the first seven batters in order, Conover yielded a solo home run to break the scoreless tie in the third. GS added another with an RBI single in the same inning. He settled in after that, holding the Eagles off the scoreboard the remainder of his time in the game.
Conover exited with one out in the seventh and finished the night with 6.1 strong innings, allowing three hits, 2 runs, three walks and struck out a career-high nine batters.
Joe Mazza came in from the bullpen and promptly caught a runner stealing with a pickoff move and struck out the hitter to quickly put an end to the Georgia Southern inning. Mazza got the first two outs of the eighth before making way for
Grant Besser.
With two runners on and the tying run at the plate, Besser struck out his man to put out the fire. Besser then shut down GS in the ninth to cap off a four-out save, his first for Rutgers.
The RU bats put pressure on all night, and ultimately broke through in the fourth inning against GS ace Ty Fisher.
Josh Kuroda-Grauer led off the frame with a triple – one of his two triples on the night – and scored on a two-out double from
Cameron Love. The Scarlet Knights tied it up in the sixth on an
Evan Sleight RBI single and would take the lead in the very next inning.
In the top of the seventh,
Ryan Lasko reached on an infield single with one out. After he advanced on a passed ball,
Trevor Cohen doubled into left field to bring him home and give Rutgers the 3-2 lead.
Rutgers kept the pressure on, adding 2 more runs in the eighth. Kuroda-Grauer once again tripled to start things off and would score when the right fielder dropped a fly ball off the bat of
Jordan Sweeney. Sleight then bunted Sweeney to third and Love put down a suicide squeeze to bring him home and make it 5-2 and help lock up the win.
The Scarlet Knights will now wrap up their series with Georgia Southern on Saturday, with the teams scheduled for a doubleheader because of Sunday's weather forecast. The first game will begin at 2 p.m. and the finale will take place approximately 45 minutes after the conclusion of game one.
Follow Rutgers Baseball on Social Media
