Baseball Shuts Down Notre Dame, 2-1

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NOTRE DAME, IND. - Will Walsh (New Milford, N.J.) and Zack Granite (Staten Island, N.Y.) drove in runs to give Joe DiRocco (East Hanover, N.J.) all the run support he needed as the Seton Hall baseball team defeated Notre Dame, 2-1, Friday evening at Frank Eck Stadium.  The win is the Pirates third-straight, tying a season-high, and leaves them one shy of their 1,900^th in program history.

DiRocco (6-0) allowed only one run and struck out four in 6.1 innings of work to win the pitcher's duel over Brian Dupra (2-5) who suffered the loss despite lasting a complete game - eight innings - yielding two runs on seven hits.

For the fifth-straight game, Seton Hall (20-19, 7-9) plated the first run to take an early lead.  Frank Esposito (Staten Island, N.Y.) led off the top of the third with a single, moved 90 feet on a sacrifice bunt by Walsh, and scored on a triple to left field off the bat of Granite.

Walsh then doubled the lead with a solo home run just inside the right field foul pole for his team-leading fourth of the year, and second this week.

After Notre Dame (14-21-1, 5-10) fell behind, 2-0, they looked to build momentum with one out in their half of the fifth inning.  Joe Hudson walked and Adam Norton singled.  When DiRocco attempted to throw to first base to pick Norton off, there was no one covering the base making DiRocco hold the ball and be called for a balk. 

With one out and runners on second and third, the senior right-hander from East Hanover quickly stepped off the mound and turned to his left throwing a strike to A.J. Rusbarsky (Freehold, N.J.) at second base and to pick off Norton for the second out.  Two batters later, DiRocco fanned Greg Sherry to end the threat.

In the sixth inning, the Fighting Irish did cut their deficit in half when Alex Robinson plated Eric Jagielo with a single to center field, but DiRocco finished the frame by inducing back-to-back fly outs off the bats of Mick Doyle and Hudson to end the inning.

In the seventh inning, a one-out single by Frank DeSico chased DiRocco in favor of Ryan Harvey (Manalapan, N.J.)  who came in to strike out Jagielo and force Trey Mancini to ground out.  Harvey continued his dominance in the eighth and ninth by striking out five batters to pick up his team-leading fourth save of the year.

Mike Genovese (Livingston, N.J.) was the only Pirate to end the game with multiple hits, as he went 2-for-4 with two perfectly placed hit-and-run singles moving Giuseppe Papaccio (Nutley, N.J.) first and third on the plays.  He also ended with two stolen bases.

The Pirates and the Fighting Irish will continue the three-game series tomorrow afternoon with game two.  First pitch is scheduled for 2:05 p.m.