Spartans first team All-Americans lead the way to National
Championship game
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (June 1,
2006) - Top-ranked University of Tampa rode the backs of
its two first-team All-Americans to a commanding 13-3 victory over
12th-ranked Franklin Pierce in game 12 of the 2006 NCAA
Division II Baseball Championships at Paterson Field tonight.
Tampa (53-6), looking for its
fourth baseball National Championship, will face
5th-ranked Cal State Chico (46-20) for the title on
Saturday night at 8 p.m. (EDT). The Wildcats, winners of two
previous National Championships, advanced to Saturday's title game
with a 9-5 victory over No. 4 Montevallo University (43-18) in
today's first game.
Franklin Pierce (46-13) concludes
its most successful season in program history with a second trip to
the semifinal round of the National Championships in four years.
The Ravens shattered the program's single-season win record of 32
set each of the previous three seasons.
"I'm real proud of the year our
team had," said Franklin Pierce Head Coach Jayson
King. "We worked hard all year to make it as far as
we have. You have to tip your cap to Tampa. They got great pitching
and hitting, with their star players really stepping it up
tonight."
Tampa's first team All-America duo
of senior Lee Cruz (Pasco, Fla./Pasco Hernandez
CC) and junior Sergio Perez (Tampa,
Fla./Leto) led the Spartans to their
18th-straight win. Cruz paced the offense, hitting
2-for-6 with a pair of home runs, including a grand slam, and six
RBI. The two homers gave him a program-record and NCAA Division II
leading 26 for the season, breaking the program's single-season
mark of 25 set by former Major Leaguer Tino Martinez in 1986. Perez
collected his 11th win of the season (11-2), allowing
three runs, two earned, on six hits with nine strikeouts and a walk
in seven plus innings of work.
"My slider was really good today,"
said Perez. "I knew that with their hitters, (Franklin Pierce)
would pretty much come out swinging and I just tried to keep them
off balance."
Tampa Head Coach Joe
Urso was quick to explain the rationale of pitching
Perez today and not holding him for Saturday's final.
"Franklin Pierce jumped out on us
7-0 earlier this season so we knew the respect their offense
deserves," Urso said. "We felt this was the game we had to win so
we didn't have to worry about the (if necessary) game on Friday."
Junior Craig Corrado
(Tampa, Fla.) was 3-for-5 with a stolen base and two
runs scored, while classmate Roberto Mena (Rio Grande,
Puerto Rico) hit 2-4 with an RBI and three runs
scored. Junior Troy Ferguson (Rochester,
Mass.) finished 2-5 with a double, stolen base, RBI
and two runs scored.
Freshman Scott
Savastano (Plymouth, Mass./Plymouth North) provided
half of Franklin Pierce's six-hit output, going 3-for-4 with a
double and RBI. Junior Vinny Pennell (Spencer,
Mass./David Prouty) hit 1-3 with two RBI, while
junior All-American Garrett Olson (Norway, Maine/Oxford
Hills) finished 1-2 with two runs scored.
Junior Arric Mather
(Danville, N.H./Winnacunnet) was handed just his
second loss of the season (9-2), getting hit for six runs, five
earned, on ten hits with five strikeouts and no walks over
five-plus innings of work.
"Overall, Arric pitched pretty
well," said King. "But when he made a mistake (Tampa) made him pay
for it."
Tampa got on the board first with a
pair of runs after two outs were recorded. Senior leftfielder
Orlando Rosales (Dade City, Fla./Pasco Hernando
CC) laced a double to the wall in left-center before
Cruz, the ABCA/Rawlings Division II Player of the Year, smacked a
towering home run over the scoreboard in left, tying Tino
Martinez's school record.
The Spartans extended their lead to
three runs in the fourth with senior J.R. Hopf's
(Tampa, Fla.) second home run of the year, a solo
shot to lead off the inning. UT took advantage of three Franklin
Pierce errors in scoring a run in the fifth. Ferguson led off with
a single through the right side, stole second and advanced to third
when the throw got past Ravens second baseman Mike
Chambers (Londonderry, N.H./Londonderry). Ferguson
scored when Franklin Pierce leftfielder Randy Fenton's
(Worcester, Mass./Doherty) throw home after a fly out
was off the mark.
Tampa broke the game open with five
in the sixth, capped by Cruz's two-out grand slam to dead center to
break Martinez's home run mark. The Spartans led off the inning
with three-straight singles from the bottom third of the lineup,
including an RBI single down the leftfield line by Mena.
Franklin Pierce scratched together
a run in the home half of the sixth to avoid the shutout. Olson was
hit by a pitch and later scored on a Pennell single up the middle
with two outs. Tampa scored twice in the eighth to open an 11-1
advantage, but Franklin Pierce wouldn't go down quietly, loading
the bases with none out in the eighth to chase Perez. Savastano
notched an RBI single through the right side to end Perez's night
and Pennell drove in the second with a sacrifice fly off Tampa's
first of two relievers that closed the game out.
"This was a great experience for
all the young guys on the team," said Savastano. "I can't wait to
get back, especially with the way this finished tonight. We will be
back."
Boxscore
& Play-by-Play
