Bobby Grigas threw eight dominant innings of shutout baseball while giving up only five hits and the Susquehanna University Baseball team capitalized on an eight run fourth inning to defeat No. 16 Catholic University 11-0 Friday afternoon on Bollinger Field in Selinsgrove.
Susquehanna (4-11 overall, 1-0 Landmark) struck first in the bottom of the second inning when Ryan Casey had reached base on a walk and Craig Roumes advanced him to second base after he was hit by a pitch. Anthony Dombrowski scored Casey on an RBI single.
Catholic (14-4, 4-3), ranked No. 16 in the latest D3baseball.com national poll, threatened to even the score in the top of the third inning when they had a runner on second base with two outs. Grigas was able to produce a ground out to third base as he retired the side with the River Hawks still leading 1-0.
The River Hawks broke the game wide open in the bottom of the fourth inning, pushing across eight runs and sent 12 batters to the plate in the inning to take control.
After Nick Berger lead off the inning by reaching on an error, Casey and Roumes completed back to back bunt singles to load the bases with no one out. Dombrowski followed it up with the first RBI of the inning on a walk that brought in Berger.
Tom Giaimo hit an infield single to score Casey and give the River Hawks a 3-0 lead. With the bases still loaded, Justin Miller grounded out to bring in Roumes and advanced the runners to second and third base. After Cole Luzins was intentionally walked, Ben Burman came up with a huge 2 RBI single to extend the lead to 6-0.
Following a pitching change for Catholic, Peter Yarem kept the line moving with an RBI single to score Luzins. Still with only one out in the inning, Berger came up for the second time in the inning and continued the hitting barrage for the River Hawks with an RBI double that scored Burman and brought Yarem to third base.
Casey concluded the scoring with an RBI ground out that scored Yarem and Susquehanna took a 9-0 lead into the fifth inning.
As he did all day, Grigas followed up a run scoring inning by the River Hawks with a shut-down inning of his own.
Giaimo padded the lead with an RBI single to score Dombrowski in the bottom of the fifth to give Susquehanna a 10-0 lead into the sixth.
In the sixth inning, Catholic threatened once more with two outs when they got a player to third base for the first time in the game. Grigas retired the next batter with a grounder to keep the shutout alive.
The River Hawks pieced together a rally in the seventh inning without recording a single hit to push the lead to 11-0.
The final line on Grigas was eight shutout innings pitched, five hits, three walks and three strikeouts.
Andrew Russell threw a scoreless ninth inning and the River Hawks cemented an 11-0 shutout victory in their first Landmark game of the season.
Giaimo, Burman, and Dombrowski all had two RBI apiece for Susquehanna.
The River Hawks continue play against Catholic in a doubleheader Saturday at Bollinger Field. Game one is at 12:30 p.m. and game two will start at approximately 3 p.m.
