AUGUSTA, N.J. - FDU Baseball completed a wild day of baseball at the NEC Championships at Skylands Stadium in Augusta, N.J. The Knights fell in the winner's bracket matchup with the top seed LIU, and then the Knights immediately bounced back to beat Wagner in a heart-stopping game where FDU won on a walk-off wild pitch to top the Seahawks and advance to the NEC title game.
Game One: 10-3 Loss vs. LIU:
The Knights got on the board first in their game with the Sharks with
Hunter Ray's 30th home run of the season, giving the Knights a 1-0 lead. The Sharks then answered with a run in the bottom of the first, and then got on the board with three more runs in the third and fourth innings, putting the Knights behind early.
FDU scratched across another run in the sixth, but the Sharks responded with two of their own runs, and were able to get the game over the finish line, topping the Knights and advancing to the NEC Championship Series as the one seed being undefeated.
FDU had to quickly rebound and then get back to work in a elimination game against the three seed Wagner Seahawks.
Game Two: 11-10 Win vs. Wagner:
FDU started the game behind in this elimination game, dropping the first seven runs of the ballgame, as the Knights offense was stifled, while Wagner continued to scratch across runs. FDU finally broke through in the seventh inning of the ballgame, as the Knights got a zero from reliever
Nick Noble, and then got to work on offense.
The Knights broke the Seahawk shutout on a
Jeremy Cheeseman RBI single, and then loaded the bases and cashed in on five straight RBI walks. The Seahawk lead that was seven, was cut down to just one after the seventh inning of play.
Wagner added an RBI single in the top half of the eighth inning to make it a two run ballgame, but once again FDU was up to the task. FDU cashed in on a Wagner throwing error, and then got the game tied with a
Garryn Plummer steal of home, catching Wagner napping on an infield fly rule that turned into a run for the Knights, tieing the game at eight.
Johnathan Gomez added a two run single in the eighth to give FDU their first lead of the ballgame against Wagner, and their first lead in the day of play in over eight hours.
Wagner then hit a dramatic home run, tieing the game on a two run shot off of
Nick Noble, making the game all square heading into the bottom of the ninth inning.
FDU worked a pair of walks and got two runners into scoring position on a Wagner wild pitch, and then proceeded to cash in on another Seahawk miscue, scoring the game winning run on a wild pitch, sealing the ballgame for FDU, and clinching a spot in the NEC Championship Series for the first time since 2016.
FDU will take on LIU in the NEC Championship Series at Skylands Stadium, with the first game set for 3 p.m. eastern time. The game will be streamed on ESPN+ and live stats are available on fduknights.com
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