UMass Lowell River Hawks Win Series Opener at UAlbany 7-1

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TROY, N.Y. – The win streak continues as the UMass Lowell baseball team (10-20, 4-6 AE) took game one of the weekend series at UAlbany (3-21-1, 0-10 AE) with a 7-1 victory at the Joseph L. Bruno Stadium.

“It was a great team win,” said head coach Ken Harring. “Roddy Hernandez’s loud homer in the second inning set the tone for our offense and we kept tacking on. [Joshua] Becker and [Brendan] Williams were great on the mound tonight. Now we focus on tomorrow.”

Graduate student Joshua Becker (Burlington, Mass.) earned the win to improve to 2-1 this season after throwing 5.0 innings with four strikeouts and one earned run. Senior Brendan Williams (Auburn, N.Y.) was impressive out of the bullpen, going 4.0 innings with six strikeouts and allowed just four hits.

Joshua Becker’s four strikeouts on the night give him a career total of 224 and make the graduate student the Division I record holder for career strikeouts.

Senior Trey Brown (Rochester, N.Y.) went 3-4 with three RBIs to lead the team and added one stolen base. Juniors Fritz Genther (Kingston, N.Y.) and Roddy Hernandez (Jersey City, N.J.) tallied two hits and two RBIs each. Senior Ryan Proto (Centerville, Mass.) and graduate students Gerry Siracusa (Kinnelon, N.J.) and Robert Gallagher (Mullica Hill, N.J.) each had a hit in the win.

The Great Danes took an early lead behind a solo homerun by Will Feil in the bottom of the first. UMass Lowell responded in the top of the second after Roddy Hernandez hit his first homerun of the season to bring in two runs for the lead. Joshua Becker escaped a bases loaded jam in the bottom of the second, forcing a fly out to end the frame and keeping the River Hawks in front.

Gerry Siracusa’s one-out single and two stolen bases put him on third before Fritz Genther’s RBI single brought in the graduate student to give UMass Lowell a two-run lead. Trey Brown tacked on another run for the River Hawks with an RBI single to give the visitors a 4-1 lead through three.

A 1-2-3 fourth inning saw Becker record his third strikeout of the game and Alex Luccini make an incredible diving catch in the left field for the final out of the frame. Trey Brown’s third hit of the night brought in Luccini to push the lead to 5-1 in the top of the fifth inning.

Despite two hits, Becker shut the door in the fifth and kept the River Hawks in front by four. Robert Gallagher’s RBI single brought in Roddy Hernandez to add a run before blooper down the third base line from Genther brought in Gallagher from second to push the lead to six. Brendan Williams took over in the bottom of the sixth and threw a scoreless frame with one strikeout.

Williams threw a scoreless seventh and then shut the door in the eighth, striking out three straight batters to send the game to the ninth. The senior threw his fourth straight scoreless inning and secured the victory with an emphatic strikeout to end the game.