MANCHESTER, N.H. – The Saint Anselm College baseball team set a new program record for single season home runs in the doubleheader sweep over American International College on Friday.
With the sweep, the Hawks move to .500 on the season at 22-22. The Yellow Jackets see their season come to a close at 11-34 overall. The Hawks have qualified for the Northeast-10 Conference postseason and will be in action on Tuesday, May 10 with an opponent and location still to be determined.
Saint Anselm belted 12 home runs in the double header, six in each game. The Hawks tied their single-game record in both games for home runs in a single game, having now hit six in a game four times in program history. The Hawks are also the first team in NCAA Division II to hit six homers in each end of a doubleheader this season.
The Hawks have posted 22 wins 2022 which are the most since the 2012 season. Saint Anselm closes the regular season with 13 wins in conference play which is the most since 2013.
Junior Mike Borrelli(Salisbury, Mass.) and senior Kyle Maurice(Exeter, N.H.) led Saint Anselm with three home runs each. Borrelli hit all three of his in game one while Maurice slugged all three of his in game two. Junior Brady Doran(Greenville, S.C.), senior Matt Collins(Beverly, Mass.), graduate student Salvatore Pezzolla(East Greenbush, N.Y.), sophomore Nolan Elmore(Brentwood, N.H.), and junior Will Panarello(Barrington, R.I.) recorded home runs on the day. Panarello's big fly is the first of his collegiate career while Collins registered his first multi-home run game of his collegiate career.
Maurice now has 14 home runs this season which is second most in a single season. The senior currently ranks ninth in hits (61), third in runs batted in (44), and is tied for third in runs scored (44) all in a single season. Maurice is batting .391 this season which is fifth highest in team annals.
Juniors Avery Mosseau(Bedford, N.H.) and John Donovan(Lowell, Mass.) collected wins in the doubleheader. Mosseau came on in relief, recording 1.1 innings of hitless work with two strikeouts. Donovan was the first Saint Anselm student-athlete out of the bullpen in game two, going three innings to grab his first collegiate win.
GAME ONE: Saint Anselm 14, American International 13
American International would push six runs across in the top of the eighth inning to give the visitors a 13-9 lead. Angel Mendez opened the frame with a double before scoring on a single by Jackson Haker. Michael Nazzaro brought home Haker with a single of his own. The Yellow Jackets loaded the bases and a hit by pitch scored another run before the bases were cleared on a double by Alexander Morse to put the Yellow Jackets up late.
A walk and a single followed a strikeout to open the bottom of the eighth. That set up Collins, who launched his second home run of the game, driving in three to bring Saint Anselm to within one at 13-12. Doran followed with a double and reached third on a groundout. He would score on a wild pitch to tie the score at 13.
Mosseau got the Yellow Jackets to go three up, three down in the top of the ninth.
Borrelli would be the only Hawks batter in the bottom of the ninth inning. He worked a full count and deposited the walk-off home run over the left center field fence, giving the Hawks a 14-13 win in game one.
Earlier in the contest, Collins led off the bottom of the first with a single before coming around to score on the record breaking home run, off the bat of Doran just three pitches into the inning which gave the Hawks a 2-0 lead.
Dalton Quinn would hit a solo home run in the top of the second to cut the Hawks lead to 2-1.
Senior Mike Pierro(North Andover, Mass.) worked a walk to lead off the Saint Anselm half of the second before scoring on a triple by Elmore. Panarello followed with a sacrifice fly to extend the Hawks lead to 4-1.
Borrelli drove his first ball out of Sullivan Park in the bottom of the third after Pezzolla netted a one-out single. Borrelli's two-run home run pushed the advantage to 6-1.
Quinn plated another run in the top of the fourth, scoring Nazzaro who was hit by a pitch to lead off the frame which made the contest, 6-2.
Collins got the run back in the bottom of the inning with his first home run of the day, a solo home run to left field.
The Yellow Jackets loaded the bases in the fifth inning and a walk plated one run before a pair of singles scored two more. However, senior Andy Grygorcewicz(Northampton, Mass.) got out of the jam with a foul out at 7-5 in favor of the Hawks.
Borrelli belted his second home run of the game in the fifth inning which gave Saint Anselm an 8-5 lead.
Neither team scored in the sixth inning, the first time in the contest that neither team pushed across a run.
American International got the Hawks lead back to one in the top of the seventh as a ground-rule double by Kiernan Caffrey plated one run before a wild pitch brought home another run at 8-7.
A sacrifice fly by Borrelli scored Doran in the bottom of the seventh to extend the Hawks lead to 9-7.
GAME TWO: Saint Anselm 14, American International 2
Maurice got the Hawks on the board in the bottom of the second inning with a solo home run. Elmore followed with a homer of his own, pushing the score to 2-0.
Saint Anselm added two more runs in the bottom of the third as Pezzolla reached on a fielder's choice before Maurice drove his second homer of the game over the right center field fence which extended the lead to 4-0.
Neither squad would cross the plate again until the bottom of the seventh inning. Maurice drove in Pezzolla with an RBI single before Elmore tripled to score Borelli. The triple was followed by a RBI single from Panarello which gave the Hawks a 7-0 lead.
Pezzolla recorded a two-run home run in the bottom of the seventh which gave Saint Anselm a 9-0 lead.
A walk with the bases loaded plated a run for American International before Chad Lavelle reached on a fielder's choice to score another in the top of the seventh, which is all the Yellow Jackets offense could muster in game two.
With one out in the bottom of the eighth Panarello drove a 2-0 pitch down the left field line for his first collegiate homer before the Hawks loaded the bases for Maurice, who launched his third homer of the day. This one was a grand slam which extended the lead to 14-2 for Saint Anselm. That also gave Maurice eight runs batted in game two.
Junior Travis MacMurdo(Tewksbury, Mass.) got the Yellow Jackets to go in order to close the ballgame.
