The St. Thomas Aquinas College baseball team prevailed, 15-12 in 10 innings over Dominican College at Provident Bank Park. Mike Russo's walk-off homer broke the school record for RBIs, and helped establish a new team mark for wins as their record improves to 35-11, eclipsing the record of 34 set last season. Dominican fell to 28-20 overall.
Senior Day 2013 began innocently enough, with tribute being paid to the nine Spartans appearing in uniform for their final home contest. But once things got underway, the regular-season finale took on a decidedly unusual feel.
After Dominican went scoreless in the top of the first, the Spartans went to work against Dominican ace Peter Martinez, who entered the game with a 1.62 season ERA. If STAC was intimidated, they didn't show it, roughing up the Charger starter with five runs on six hits in the first frame.
Stanley Susana brought home two on a triple to center, and Russo, Felipe Campusano, and Andrew Romanella drove home runs. Dominican would chip away with a pair in the second against Spartan starter Joe DePool before knocking him from the gate in what looked to be a decisive third inning.
Dominican sent 13 batters to the plate, recording nine runs and nine hits and chasing DePool in the process, to grab an 11-5 edge. While Martinez seemed to settle in, having retired STAC in order in the second, he was not fooling the hosts on this day.
Efrian Bautista brought in a pair of runs with a double and Campusano brought in another as the first five Spartans to bat in the inning recorded hits, ending Martinez' day. When the dust settled, STAC had rallied for six runs to tie the score at an improbable 11-11 after just three innings.
Tyler Clark homered off STAC reliever Brian Tompkins in the fourth to put the visitors back on top, but strangely the game would largely belong to the bullpens thereafter. The Spartans scratched out the tying run in the sixth off reliever Ryan Calby when Russo's second RBI of the game brought the tally to a dozen runs each.
Calby worked seven strong innings of relief for the Chargers, while Jon Scott and Dan Diaz held Dominican scoreless over the final four innings, setting the stage for Russo's heroics.
With two on and two out, Russo jumped on the first pitch from Caleb Whitely deep into the left field bleachers, touching off a spirited celebration as Spartans poured from the home dugout. The homer was Russo's 10th of the season - a team wood-bat record - and his five runs batted in ran his season total to an amazing 57, eclipsing the previous mark of 53 set by Vin Malzahn two seasons ago.
Diaz allowed just one hit in two innings to improve to 3-0, and Russo and Bautista had three hits each in the 19-hit outburst. The Spartans were ranked #5 in the official NCAA Division II East Rankings this week and are hoping to move up after winning all four games on the week.
STAC has now won 13 straight games and 19-of-20 overall to wrap up the regular season. They will begin the East Coast Conference Tournament as the number 1 seed, with opponent, site and date to be determined. The winner of the ECC Tournament receives an automatic bid to the NCAA Division II Tournament.