Righter Leads Blue Jays Over St. Joseph's (NY), 7-2, In NCAA Baseball Regional

Senior righthander allowed four hits while striking out nine in the complete game win.

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Matt Righter allowed two runs on four hits in a complete game victory Friday in the NCAA Regional.

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May 21, 2004

Box Score

Boyertown, PA - Johns Hopkins senior righthander Matt Righter (Clarion, PA/Lawrenceville Prep) allowed two runs on four hits while striking out a season-high nine batters to lead the top-ranked Blue Jays to a 7-2 win over St. Joseph's (NY) Friday afternoon at Bear Stadium in the NCAA Division III Mid-Atlantic Baseball Regional.

Hopkins will face the winner of Friday night's DeSales-Rowan game Saturday at 11 a.m. The Blue Jays, the top seed in the regional, have now won the first two games of the regional for just the third time in 13 appearances. St. Joseph's was eliminated from the tournament, ending its season at 26-18.

Hopkins, which improved to 39-2, struck first with two runs in the top of the second. With one out senior designated hitter Brian Morley (Tappan, NY/Don Bosco Prep) singled to left, and senior leftfielder Craig Cetta (Randolph, NJ/Randolph) followed with a two-run homer to center.

Senior rightfielder Rob Morrison (Malibu, CA/Loyola) led off the third by singling to left and advanced to third when junior centerfielder Paul Winterling (Glenelg, MD/McDonogh) doubled to left center. Both runners then scored when junior first baseman Mike Durgala (Annandale, VA/Thomas Jefferson) doubled to centerfield.

After Durgala moved to third on a wild pitch, Cetta worked a walk to put runners on the corners. Junior third baseman Mike Spiciarich (Syosset, NY/Chaminade) followed with a single down the leftfield line, plating Durgala and sending Cetta to third. Following a pitching change senior shortstop Carl Ippolito (Ewing, NJ/Pennington School) hit a sacrifice fly to center to score Cetta and give the Blue Jays a six-run lead.

Senior catcher Bryan Eberle (Frederick, MD/Urbana) led off the sixth with a walk, but was erased when senior second baseman Tim Casale (West Hempstead, NY/Chaminade) bounced into a fielder's choice. Casale then advanced to third on a single by Morrison and scored on a sacrifice fly by Winterling.

That would prove to be more than enough run support for Righter, who opened the game with 5.1 perfect innings. Righter, who improved to 7-0 on the year, allowed just one hit in the first seven innings before the Golden Eagles pushed across two runs in the bottom of the eighth.

St. Joseph's loaded the bases with no outs on a single, walk and hit batter before Righter struck out Andrew Markowitz. Kevin Ginter followed with a two-run single to left and a single by Dan Quinn again loaded the bases, but Righter got Adam Gledhill to hit into a double play to escape furthur damage.

Righter then retired the side in order in the ninth to post his third complete game of the season.

Cetta finished 2-for-4 with two runs scored and a pair of RBIs for the Blue Jays, while Durgala was 2-for-5 with two runs batted in and a run scored. Morrison, Winterling and Spiciarich also each had two hits for Hopkins.

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