Orange, Calif. -- The Ithaca College baseball team (4-1) won its fourth straight game, completing a two-game sweep of #21 Chapman by a score of 5-0 Monday. The Bombers, who are 4-1 for the first time since 2004, play at Whittier Tuesday at 3 p.m.
Freshman
John Prendergast improved to 2-0 by throwing a complete-game five-hit shutout. He held the Panthers hitless through the first five innings and four of the five hits they collected didn't leave the infield.
Prendergast, who hasn't allowed a run in 16 innings this spring, struck out five batters and needed just 112 pitches to record his first career shutout.
His performance was Ithaca's second shutout of the season; the Bombers' ERA is 1.23 and the seven runs they've allowed are a school-record low through five games.
Chapman put runners in scoring position in four of the last five innings but
Prendergast worked out of each jam. In the fifth he induced a double play with runners on first and third; in the sixth the Panthers used a walk, groundout and passed ball to put a runner on third with two outs but
Prendergast fought back from a 2-0 count to strike out Chapman's clean-up hitter. The Panthers collected back-to-back infield hits in the seventh before
Prendergast retired the next two batters on infield grounders and in the ninth he worked out of a two-on, two-out jam.
Second baseman
Matt Keller and freshman Vinny Gneo sparked Ithaca's three-run third. Freshman left fielder
Christian Brown led off with a single and took second on a hit by sophomore shortstop
Tim Locastro. After senior center fielder
Mike Rosenbaum reached on a botched double play attempt,
Keller brought home the game's first run with an infield grounder and two batter later
Gneo singled in two more.
Senior shortstop
Jarrod Surine walked to lead off the sixth and scored on a wild pitch and the Bombers tacked on another insurance run in the ninth when senior right fielder
Teagen Barresi doubled home
Rosenbaum.
Brown and
Rosenbaum both had two of Ithaca's eight hits with
Rosenbaum scoring a pair of runs.
Barresi drew a pair of walks.
Box score
