(Aaron Phillips Photo Credit: GoBonnies.com)
By David Malchak
The St. Bonaventure University baseball team emerged victorious over Dayton on Saturday afternoon, winning 9-0 in the first Atlantic 10 home game.
The Bonnies were carried on a dominant starting pitching performance by junior Aaron Phillips. He struck out seven batters in eight innings, and only gave up four hits and three walks.
Dayton’s Austin Cline did not have as much control of the plate, allowing seven walks in five innings. But, he did not benefit from an error in the field behind him either, which caused two unearned runs.
The source of the error was caused when Bonnies’ Jared Baldinelli reached to lead off the second inning with a throwing error by Fylers’ third baseman Pat Meehan. Baldinelli moved to second after a double by T.J. Baker, and scored on a groundout by Bradley Gresock. Then Baker scored after an RBI single by Taishi Terashima. So, after two, the Bonnies had a 2-0 lead.
St. Bonaventure added another run in the third when Bonnies shortstop Cole Peterson led off with a walk and stole second, then moved to third on a balk. Then he scored on a sacrifice fly to center field by Baldinelli, and St. Bonaventure’s lead was 3-0.
In the sixth inning, Cline gave up a lead-off bunt single to Phillips and walked Baker. That was where his day ended. Ryan MacCarrick then hit an RBI single, followed by a two-run double by David Vaccaro. St. Bonaventure had put up a four spot in the sixth, and had a 7-0 lead.
The Bonnies added two more runs in the seventh, one of which was also unearned. From there they did not look back. Brian Pulli came in to pitch an easy ninth inning to close it out.
The Bonnies and Flyers will play again on Sunday with a doubleheader starting at noon at Fred Handler Park.
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