Farmingdale, N.Y. - The Farmingdale State baseball team has played four games at the RussMatt Invitational down in Florida, with two wins and two losses. Head Coach Keith Osik earned his 300th career win with a 2-0 defeat of Wheaton (Mass.) yesterday afternoon. Osik is in his 13th season as the Rams head coach and holds a career record of 300-196.
FSC still has five games remaining in Florida as they play a pair of doubleheaders versus Hamilton and Thomas (ME) and a single game against Cobleskill.
Friday, March 16th
Farmingdale State split a doubleheader with Springfield as they won 2-0 before falling in the second game, 8-0.
Rams junior leftfielder Anthony Gigante (Bedford Hills, N.Y.) and junior shortstop Shawn Blasberg (Sound Beach, N.Y.) each tallied an RBI single in the first game. Senior David Otero Jr. (Shelton, Conn.) struck out five and threw 4.1 scoreless innings as he earned the game one victory.
In the second game, FSC only managed one hit off Pride sophomore Shawn Babineau (Ashland, Mass.) who recorded 10 strikeouts and threw a complete game shutout.
Saturday, March 17th
The Rams split with Wheaton (Mass.), winning the first game 2-0 and dropping the second 16-4.
Farmingdale State went up 1-0 in the first inning of game one on an RBI groundout by sophomore first baseman Ernie Geraci (East Moriches, N.Y.) which scored junior centerfielder Joseph Roche (Westbury, N.Y.). In the sixth, Blasberg singled through the left side to drive in Geraci and score the second run of the game. Junior Matthew Constantine (West Babylon, N.Y.) only allowed five hits and threw a complete game shutout to lead the Rams to the 2-0 victory.
The Lyons jumped out to an early 6-0 lead through the first inning and a half of game two. In the bottom of the second, Farmingdale State senior second baseman Domenic Palumbo (Old Bethpage, N.Y.) doubled to score Gigante. Later in the inning, Palumbo would score on an error to cut the deficit to 6-2. After a scoreless third, Wheaton (Mass.) broke the game open with a nine-run fourth inning to increase their advantage to 15-2. FSC added their final two runs of the game on an RBI single by freshman third baseman Joey Barbuto (North Babylon, N.Y.) and a Brandon Ernest (Owings, Md.) RBI triple as they fell in the second game.
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