ST. MARY'S CITY, Md. — In his 38th season at the helm, head coach Ross Natoli reached 750 career wins as the Catholic baseball team moved to 3-0 on the season with a road victory over St. Mary's on Tuesday afternoon.
The Cardinals offense was clicking on all cylinders as they hung 11 runs on the Seahawks, including four on St. Mary's starter Tommy Brill in the opening three innings.
Catholic wasted no time putting runs on the board as Dante Pozzi scored before the Seahawks recorded an out. After the lead-off hitter reached base on an error, Zach Burton drove him in with a double to the left-center field gap.
Mitchel Johnson doubled the Cardinal lead with a clutch two-out hit, knocking a single into left to score Burton.
St. Mary's responded with one in the bottom of the inning and one more in the second, but then Johnson struck again, powering a two-RBI triple to left center, scoring Burton and Joe Marini to push Catholic ahead in the bottom of third.
The score held at 4-2 until the fifth inning when Catholic took advantage of a calamity of Seahawks errors. After Marini drove in a run with a single, errors piled up for St. Mary's and allowed Catholic to plate two more.
In the following inning, Justin McCarthy scored on a balk before another run crossed the plate via an error. St. Mary's finished the game with five errors while Catholic was clean in the field, committing none.
St. Mary's cut the gap to 9-5 in the eighth inning but two more Cardinal runs salted the game away in the ninth. Pozzi scored three on the day while McCarthy and Marini accounted for two each.
Catholic used seven pitches in the contest as the bullpen was especially effective. Henry Escandon allowed just one hit over the fourth and fifth innings, striking out two while Chance Legere pitched a beautiful sixth, sending the Seahawk down one-two-three and fanning two. Camden Mounts and Brendan Martin were also spotless as neither allowed a hit.
Natoli's men will now return to Talbot Field looking to continue the solid start to the campaign. The Cardinals will welcome Salve Regina for a weekend series. The teams are currently slated to play a doubleheader on Saturday and a single game on Sunday, with first pitch scheduled for 12 p.m. on both days.