Baseball Sweeps Maritime Improving On Best Start In School History

THROGGS NECK, N.Y. – The St. Joseph's College (Brooklyn) baseball team helped by a pair of home runs by Mike Cundari (Staten Island, NY/St. Peter's) captured both ends of a doubleheader against Maritime with a 10-4 victory in game one and a 6-2 triumph in the nightcap on Sunday afternoon at Reinhart Field.

The Bears (5-0) improve on their best start in school history while the Privateers (1-6) have lost four in a row.

In the opener, the Privateers struck first with an RBI single up the middle in the bottom of the 1st to open up a 1-0 lead. A leadoff home run by Cundari tied the game at 1 and was followed by a double by Chris Cutrone (Levittown, NY/Island Trees HS) and single from Vinny Rossi (Bayside, NY/Holy Cross) before Brian Luebcke (Astoria, NY/Monsignor McClancy) drove in Cutrone with a single giving the Bears their first lead of the game, 2-1.

The score would remain the same until the 4th inning when Danny Zaretsky (Brooklyn, NY/Lincoln) doubled to left center with Cutrone scoring to make it 3-1. Cutrone would shut down Maritime until the 5th when the Privateers sent eight batters to the plate with three runs scoring giving Maritime a 4-3 lead after five.

Cutrone surrendered four runs (two earned) allowing six hits while fanning five going the distance for his second straight complete game win of the season.

In the nightcap, the Bears would strike first on the second home run of the day by Cundari and would not look back as they scored three runs in the third and two in the fifth to open up a 6-0 lead before the Privateers scored two in the bottom of the fifth. However, the deficit proved too much to overcome for Maritime as Paul Piccirillo (Brooklyn, NY/Xavierian) pitched well going six innings allowing three hits and two runs while striking out seven to pick up his second win of the season.

Cundari finished the twinbill batting 4-for-8 and was the Bears leading run producer with six RBI and five runs scored. Luebcke went 3-for-6 with two RBI and Domenick Camerada (Staten Island, NY/Monsignor Farrell) went 2-for-3 in the nightcap driving in two runs. Rossi finished the day going 3-for-6 with all three hits coming in game one while also driving in a run.

TURNING POINT - GAME ONE

St. Joseph's trailed 4-3 heading into the 7th inning with the top of the order coming to the plate. Thomas McKenna (Bellerose, NY/St. Francis Prep) started the inning off with a single to third base which would be the start of things to come as three batters later Cundari came up and doubled in McKenna and Kevin Diaz (Staten Island, NY/Monsignor Farrell) who reached on an error to give the Bears a 5-4 lead with no outs and runners on 2nd and 3rd.

After a Cutrone walk to load the bases and a Zaretsky strikeout for the first out of the inning St. Joseph's had three consecutive hits plating four runs as the Bears would build a 9-4 lead. St. Joseph's would tack on one more for good measure with Chris Pacifico (Brooklyn, NY/St. Edmund Prep) scoring on a wild pitch. Cutrone gave up a leadoff single in the 7th before getting a double-play ball and getting a fly out to seal the win for the Bears.

TURNING POINT - GAME TWO

After Cundari homered in the 2nd to give St. Joseph's a 1-0 lead the Bears led off the 3rd inning with two straight outs before five straight batters reached base for St. Joseph's with three runs scoring helped by a Privateer error and an RBI single by Camerada giving the Bears a 4-0 advantage.

St. Joseph's would tack on two more runs in the fifth on an RBI single by Cundari and Camerada to open up a 6-0 lead before Maritime scored two in the bottom half of the inning. The combination of Piccirillo and Matt Brigando (Brooklyn, NY/St. Edmund Prep) would shut down the Privateers in the sixth and seventh innings to secure the win.

INSIDE THE BOX SCORES

• St. Joseph's batted 12-for-31 (.387) with runners on base going 8-for-19 in game one.
• Cutrone also picked up two hits scoring three runs and is now batting a team-high .615 (8-for-13) on the season with a nine-game hitting streak dating back to last season.
• Zaretsky has now reached base safely in all five games this season.
• Cundari has reached base safely in his last 21 games dating back to last season.
• Kevin Diaz went 3-for-4 in game two including a stolen base in the fifth inning.
• Piccirillo has now won 12 straight decisions dating back to 2011.

NEXT UP FOR THE BEARS