JUNE 24: DiamondDawgs win in Amsterdam

  • By TIMES TELEGRAM STAFF REPORTS

    AMSTERDAM, N.Y. — The Mohawk Valley DiamondDawgs got a strong start from Mike Appel and three RBI from Andrew Turner Friday in a 7-4 win at Amsterdam.

    The loss, coupled with the Oneonta Outlaws’ 11-7 win against the Elmira Pioneers, knocked Amsterdam’s Mohawks out of first place in the East Division of the Perfect Game Collegiate Baseball League.

    The DiamondDawgs took a 5-0 lead on the road and held off an Amsterdam comeback for the win at Shuttleworth Park. Mohawk Valley scored a run in the second inning then two each in the third and fourth to build its lead. Wagner College’s Sean Mazzio singled, went to third on the first of two doubles by Rutgers University’s Mike Martinez, and scored the first run of the game on a two-out error. Turner’s second home run of the season made it a 3-0 game one inning later.

    A pair of errors proved costly to the Mohawks in the fourth inning. Martinez led off with a double and scored on an error when a fly ball hit by Fairfield University’s Michael Conti was dropped in center field. Conti ended up at second base and moved to third on a ground ball before scoring when Fairfield teammate Kevin Radziewicz reached base on another error with two outs.

    Appel held Amsterdam scoreless on four hits through five innings. The Mohawks put their first run up in the sixth when pinch-hitter Tristen Carranza from New Mexico State and Nick Patten from the University of Delaware doubled back-to-back with one out.

    Appel, who had struck out five batters, walked one, and thrown 96 pitches, turned the ball and a 6-1 lead over to the bullpen after six innings, and a run driven in by Mazzio with a double in the top of the seventh.

    Amsterdam got a pair of runs in the bottom of the seventh. Xavier University’s Chris Givin singled with one out and scored when Chris LaVorgna from Franklin Pierce University followed with a triple against Southern New Hampshire University’s Shane Reardon. Florida Atlantic University’s Tyler Frank got LaVorgna home with a two-out single.

    Brett Kinneman, a Mohawk from North Carolina State University, reached base on Herkimer College left-hander Chris Henry’s one-out error in the eight inning and scored when St. Johnsville native and University of Maryland Terrapin Dan Maynard doubled.

    Monroe Community College’s Mt. Olive College-bound Zach Vennaro relieved Henry with two outs, and the right-hander who starred in high school at New York Mills retired the final four Amsterdam batters for his fourth save.

    Turner picked up his third RBI in the top of the ninth with a single in an inning in which Amsterdam walked two batters and hit a third.

    Indiana University’s Paul Milto, the starting pitcher in an extra-inning win against Mohawk Valley one week earlier and the final out as a pinch-hitter the next night in Little Falls, took the loss Friday. Only two of the five runs charged to him in four innings were earned.

    The Mohawks have won 12 of 16 games after losing their first three to start the season. Three of the latter four losses have come against the DiamondDawgs.

    Turner has hits in six of his last 12 at-bats, raising the second-year DiamondDawg’s average to .333, and his 11 runs batted in this summer are already two more than he had in the spring for Long Island University-Brooklyn.

    Led by Turner, the bottom three hitters in the DiamondDawgs’ lineup — Turner, Mazzio and Martinez — were 7-for-14 with a walk, three runs and four runs batted in. The rest of the lineup had three hits; Radziewicz reached base four times with a hit, a walk, a hit by pitch and an error, and scored two runs.

    Maynard was 3-for-4 for Amsterdam.

    The DiamondDawgs, who won for only the second time in seven games away from Veterans Memorial Park, play on the road again Saturday against the Albany Dutchmen. They are home Monday and Tuesday following Sunday’s scheduled off day.