No. 20 Wake Forest gets by Pirates, 4-3

Friday, February 14

Winston-Salem, N.C.

2 p.m.

Seton Hall University

0-1

Wake Forest

1-0

Seton Hall

Wake Forest

2/14/2020 6:39:00 PM | Baseball

Box Score

McLinskey fans six in first career start

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – Despite strong pitching performances from junior Ryan McLinskey (Pearl River, N.Y.) and sophomore Nick Payero (Monroe, N.J.), the Seton Hall baseball team could not get by No. 20 Wake Forest as the Demon Deacons won on a walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth, 4-3.

Making his first career start, McLinskey struck out six batters and allowed two earned runs in four innings of work. Payero (0-1) punched out four in 4.2 relief innings.

Offensively, junior Casey Dana (Montgomery, N.Y.) and senior Mike Esposito (Chester, N.J.) both had RBI singles while junior Jerry Huntzinger (Staten Island, N.Y.) and senior Connor Hood (Shrewsbury, Pa.) registered multi-hit games for the Pirates (0-1).

What Happened:

In the top of the fourth, the Pirates had the bases loaded with two outs and Esposito at the plate. The senior ripped the first pitch he saw into left field, scoring sophomore Steve Grober (Hillsborough, N.J.) from third base and giving the Hall a 1-0 lead.

The Pirates added onto their lead the next inning on an RBI single from Dana that plated freshman Devin Hack (Somerville, N.J.).

After the Demon Deacons pushed three runs across in the bottom half of the fifth, Huntzinger led off the top of the seventh with a base hit to left. He then stole second and advanced to third on a wild pitch. Senior Matt Toke (Three Bridges, N.J.) stepped to the plate and hit a dribbler back to pitcher. The pitcher looked at Huntzinger, who went halfway home before retreating to third. It wound befuddling the Wake Forest hurler, who air mailed the throw to first base in an attempt to get Toke out first, allowing the tying run to cross home to make it 3-3.

News & Notes:

Both teams stranded runners (Seton Hall left eight on and Wake Forest had nine) but it was the Demon Deacons that had the timely hit in the bottom of the ninth.
Seton Hall pitchers struck out 10 batters while the Pirates struck out 14 times.
Ryan McLinskey set career highs in innings pitched (4.0) and strikeouts (6).
The loss was Payero's second-longest outing of his career behind his start against Lafayette last season (5/1/19) where he went 6.2 innings.
Connor Hood now has 19 multi-hit games in his career and Jeremy Huntzinger has 10 career multi-hit performances.
Casey Dana posted the 55th RBI and 79th hit of his career on Friday.
Two true freshmen started for the Pirates on Friday; Devin Hack in left field and Staus Prokrovsky (Pittsgrove, N.J.) at designated hitter.
Three of the Pirates' last four season openers have been decided by one run.

Up Next:

The Pirates will wake up early tomorrow to take on Illinois at 10 a.m. There is no live stream but live stats can be found on the baseball schedule page on SHUPirates.com and live updates can be found on Twitter by following @SHUBaseball.