MEDFORD, MA (March 13, 2024) - The Tufts University men's baseball team played their final game of a five-game homestand to open up the 2024 season. They faced off against non-conference foe MIT, the Engineers bested the Jumbos 11-4.
The Jumbos (3-2) gave the ball to first-year Michael O'Brien who made his first collegiate start in his career. O'Brien struck out three batters on the day in four innings pitched. In the first inning, he induced two ground outs and one line out retiring the Engineers 1-2-3. The Jumbos started the day by leaving a man on base in the bottom of the first. Senior Patrick Solomon worked a walk then stole second in the first.
O'Brien recorded his first two strikeouts of his career in the top of the second. The Jumbos would score first in the bottom of the second inning, sophomore Owen McKiernan led off the inning with a double down the left field line. First-year Tyler Wong who was making his second start for the Jumbos advanced McKiernan to third on a fly ball to right field. With McKiernan standing on third base with one out in the inning, grad student Connor Flavin brought McKiernan home on an RBI ground out to the Engineers shortstop.
The Engineers would answer right back with two runs in the top of the third. They got their first run on an RBI single by senior Teddy Schoenfeld. They got their second run on a sacrifice fly by Jake Sonandres to put the Engineers up 2-1.
The Engineers added another two runs in the top of the fourth to get the lead to 4-1, the Jumbos would answer in the bottom half of the inning as freshman Malachi Pena doubled to right center to lead off the inning and was brought home on a sac fly RBI from Flavin to cut the Jumbos deficit in half.
The Engineers bats did not turn off in the top of fifth as they would add another three runs on the inning including a solo homer run deep to right center by Schoenfeld to make the score 7-2. The Jumbos got their last two runs of the game in the bottom of the inning as junior Henry Fleckner laced a one out double to right center, first year AJ Lysko reached first base and moved Fleckner to third on a muffed throw by the Engineer's pitcher. Pena was hit by a pitch to load the bases and McKiernan worked a walk to bring home Fleckner. Junior Ben Leonard then reached on a throwing error and Lysko scored on the play making the score 7-4.
The Engineers shut the Jumbos out in the next three innings, they also added four more runs to get the score to 11-4.
The Jumbos recorded seven hits on the day with four extra-base hits including a triple by senior Jackson Reydel who saw his first at bat of the season. First years, Brad Burns, Max Pavlik, Gabe Fitzgerald, and Mark Herlihy made their collegiate debuts for the Jumbos.
Engineers senior Saketh Gabbita was credited with the win and O'Brien received the loss.
The Jumbos will now head west to California to take on Pomona-Pitzer on Saturday, March 16, at 1 p.m. They will travel California to play eight games during spring break.
