JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (March 8, 2024) – The ETSU baseball team dropped a 10-inning contest to James Madison on Friday afternoon by a score of 6-5 at Thomas Stadium. With Friday's results, both teams move to 10-3 on the 2024 season.
ETSU had stellar offensive day totaling 16 hits in the game.
Nick Iannantone,
Cameron Sisneros and
JD Yakubinis all had three hits on Friday, while
Noah Gent and
Jamie Palmese both had two-hit days.
The Bucs used four pitchers in the series opener.
Jace Hyde made his second consecutive Friday start and worked the first five innings. He allowed four runs on five hits and struck out seven.
Andrew Cotten worked 1.2 shutout innings out of the Buccaneer bullpen, and he has now is up to 8.2 innings this spring without allowing an earned run.
Like it has now in 12 of its 13 games this season, ETSU scored first. An RBI single by Yakubinis brought around
Tommy Barth to make it 1-0 Bucs in the first inning. JMU wasted little time in answering back with a pair of runs in the second inning to take its first lead of the game, 2-1. The Bucs quickly tied the score in the bottom of the frame with an RBI single from Palmese that brought around
Cody Miller to score.
ETSU gained some separation from the Dukes in the third inning. Sisneros and Yakubinis started the stanza with back-to-back singles before
Noah Webb was hit by a pitch. With the bases loaded with nobody out, Gent drove in two with a double to make it 4-2 ETSU. Miller would push the Buccaneer advantage to three runs, 5-2, with a sacrifice fly.
The Buccaneer lead was cut to a run again in the top of the fourth as Coleman Calabrese connected on a two-run home run. The long ball for Calabrese was his sixth of the season, which leads James Madison.
Neither team would score again until the top of the eighth. JMU used some fundamental baseball to tie the score. A leadoff single was followed by a sacrifice bunt to give the Dukes with a runner in scoring position with one out. An ETSU pitching change was followed by a game-tying single to knot the score at five.
After the Dukes tied the game, the Bucs had their chances to get the lead back. ETSU had a runner thrown out at the plate in the bottom of the eighth and had runners in scoring position in both the ninth and tenth innings but none of those chances resulted in runs. On the day, ETSU left 13 runners on base.
James Madison would score the game-winning run in the top of the tenth. Back-to-back singles and a double steal had the Dukes with two runners in scoring position with nobody out. JMU scored with a sacrifice fly even with a stellar throw by Yakubinis to make it a close play at the plate.
The series between the Bucs and Dukes is scheduled to resume on Saturday. First pitch is set for 10 a.m. at Thomas Stadium.
For more information on Buccaneer baseball, visit ETSUBucs.com and click on the baseball tab.
