Tribe Edges Pirates, 2-1
March 04, 2003 | Baseball
GREENVILLE, N.C. -- Forrest Cory and Mark Harris combined to limit East Carolina to six hits as William & Mary edged the Pirates, 2-1, on Tuesday afternoon at Harrington Field.
John Lentz and Tim Jones hit back-to-back solo home runs in the first inning to supply the Tribe (8-3) with all the runs it would need.
Cory (1-0) allowed an unearned run in the bottom of the first when ECU's Kevin O'Sullivan led off with a walk, moved to third on an errant pickoff attempt, then scored on Ryan Jones' sacrifice fly to right.
From there, it was a day for pitching as Cory tossed the first five innings, allowing just three hits and one walk. Harris finished the game off by holding ECU to just two hits over the last four innings while striking out four to gain his first save.
Harris had to extinguish a ninth inning rally by the Pirates. Luke Cherry and Jamie Paige each hit one-out singles to put the tying run at second base. However, Harris struck out pinch hitter Mike DeJesus and got Ryan Jones to fly out to left to end the game.
"Between the first inning and the ninth inning, we really didn't do anything offensively," ECU head coach Randy Mazey said. "They had a freshman left-hander out there who basically threw an 83-84 mph fastball right past us. It wasn't a good day for us offensively."
ECU starter Neal Sears (1-1) was the tough-luck loser. After allowing the two first-inning homers, Sears held the Tribe to five hits while striking out six over the next six innings. Glenn Tucker pitched one-hit ball over three scoreless innings in relief for the Pirates.
Lentz and Wakefield had two hits apiece for the Tribe while Jason Tourangeau was the only Pirate with multiple hits, going 2-for-4.
The Pirates stranded 10 men on base and were unable to take advantage of four William & Mary errors.
The win snapped a 20-game losing streak for the Tribe against the Pirates. ECU has won 74 of the 92 all-time meetings against its former CAA rival and had not lost to W&M since the 1995 season.
East Carolina travels to Elon tomorrow for a 2:30 p.m. game. The Pirates return home for a two-game series against Appalachian State this Saturday and Sunday at Harrington Field.
