Union, N.J. (2/26/17) – Southpaw Mike Occhi tossed five and a third scoreless innings of relief to lead the Kean University baseball team to a 6-3 win over FDU-Florham on Sunday afternoon.
The #15/19 Cougars improve to 5-1 on the season while the Devils fall to 0-1 in their season opener.
FDU was first to strike, plating two in the second. Dave Wilbur collected the game's first RBI with a single through the left side and Joseph Bonaccorso followed with an RBI groundout for a quick 2-0 lead.
Kean took the lead for good with a four spot in the bottom of the third. With two outs, Jim Fitzgerald walked and Derek Walker followed with a single. The Cougars then collected back-to-back-to-back doubles off the bats of Matt Krupa, Frank Urso and Nick Polizzano to pull ahead, 4-3.
The Devils scratched across a single run in the fourth to close the deficit to one as Garrett Ruoff hit a bases loaded ball into the hole deep at short for the RBI.
That would be as close as FDU-Florham would get as Occhi settled things down from there and Kean added single insurance runs in the fourth and eighth.
Occhi (2-0) struck out six and walked just one with three hits.
Offensively, Urso was 1-for-3 with two RBI while Polizzano was 2-for-4 with an RBI. For the Devils, Josh DellaPietro was 2-for-4 with two runs scored.
Kean has one more game remaining before they head out west with a non-conference matchup on Tuesday vs. Moravian College at 3:30 p.m.