Sunday: W, 3–2
A 10 a.m. start time on Sunday morning had Boston College baseball out of bed early, ready to take on California on a gray and cloudy day at Harrington Athletics Village. Despite the early start, the Eagles’ afternoon didn’t end up including March Madness viewing, or even a bad case of the Sunday scaries—it was eaten up by extra innings.
Luckily for BC (16–8, 6–3 Atlantic Coast), the extra time yielded positive results as the Eagles knocked off Cal (13–11, 0–6) in 11 innings. A walk-off RBI from Kyle Wolff gave BC a 4–3 win and a 3–0 weekend sweep.
Wolff slammed the ball to the outfield wall, and Carl Schmidt had a wide-open look to grab it and hand BC an out. But Schmidt dropped it, giving Owen DeShazo enough time to go sprinting through home plate and hand his team the win.
The game was tied 2–2 for four straight innings, as neither team was able to score after Cal evened things up in the top of the sixth.
Pitching was the name of the game. Brady Miller gave up three hits and two runs (neither earned) in six innings on the mound, Chase Hartsell gave up no hits or runs in two innings, and John Kwiatkowski allowed three hits but gave up no runs or walks.
Kwiatkowski was credited with the win—his seventh of the season.
Cesar Gonzalez and Colin Larson hit RBI singles in the second and fourth innings, respectively, to put BC on the board. Cal tied it up in the top of the sixth following a fielding error by Ty Mainolfi that allowed Jett Kenady to score from second base. But the Eagles silenced them for the remainder of the game, and Wolff ultimately ended it in BC’s favor.
(Anatoly Guz / Heights Staff)
Saturday: W, 9–6
After a Friday afternoon victory, tensions were high at Harrington Athletics Village as BC looked to secure its first ACC home series of the year.
The Eagles, ignited by an eight-run sixth inning and a Danny Surowiec grand slam, defeated Cal 9–6 for their fourth consecutive win.
(Anatoly Guz / Heights Staff)
Cal came into the matchup firing. Following a hit-by-pitch and a Julio Solier fielding error, Kenady cleared the bases with an early blast to left field. The Eagles fell to a three-run deficit before recording a single out.
Despite a troubling start, BC starting pitcher Tyler Mudd escaped a bases-loaded, no-out jam and successfully limited the damage, ending the top of the opening frame with Cal up 3–0.
BC responded in the bottom half of the frame, as a Jack Toomey double down the left-field line brought Mainolfi home from second base for BC’s first run of the game.
“[Toomey’s] at-bats have just been much more consistent this year,” BC head coach Todd Interdonato said. “Him hitting the double in the first to answer that inning was really important.”
After Schmidt singled up the middle to begin the third inning, a double-play attempt in the following at-bat caused tensions to brew. Schmidt made hard contact with Mainolfi as he slid into second base, prompting a lengthy umpire video review and resulting in a warning for both teams.
BC and Cal players exchanged some words, as both Interdonato and Cal head coach Mike Neu exited their respective dugouts.
John D Mitchell took over for Mudd on the mound in the fourth. Between a wild pitch from Mitchell and a Lawson Olmstead groundball single that went between third base and shortstop, the Golden Bears extended their lead back to three. Through four innings, Cal had out-hit BC 8–3.
Joshua Hanson launched a 106 mph, 426-foot solo shot to dead center—the deepest part of the park—to extend Cal’s lead to 5–1 in the top of the fifth inning. While Cal kept tacking on hits, Golden Bears starting pitcher Ethan Foley remained untouchable, preventing any BC offense from igniting.
“I thought our bats from the second to the fifth were pretty passive,” Interdonato said. “[Foley] was just executing. He hasn’t really executed his slider and his change-up like that all year.”
It was not until a Solier walk and Mainolfi double in the sixth inning that BC got back on the scoreboard for the first time since the opening frame. The Eagles were far from finished.
With the bases loaded, Surowiec sent a blast to deep right field for a go-ahead grand slam. Surowiec’s second career home run couldn’t have come at a more pivotal time, as it energized the crowd and handed BC a 6–5 lead—its first of the day.
Despite recording six fewer hits than Cal, BC flipped the script with a massive eight-run sixth inning to erase a four-run deficit. Four walks for the Eagles led to a bases-loaded situation in Mainolfi’s at-bat, which he turned into a two-RBI sacrifice fly to put BC up 9–5.
“I was just trying to get [Mainolfi] in and score the next run,” Surowiec said. “I was just happy that he hung the slider.”
Schmidt answered with a home run of his own in the top of the seventh inning—his fourth hit of the game—but relief pitcher Kyle Kipp entered the game in the eighth and officially shut the door on Cal.
(Anatoly Guz / Heights Staff)
Friday: W, 4–3
After losing last weekend’s series to NC State, BC went into Friday’s series-opener against Cal sitting at .500 in ACC play and looking to cement its place among the top-five teams with a weekend sweep over one of the bottom squads in the conference.
Friday’s result—a 4–3 win over the Golden Bears—set the Eagles on track to achieve that goal.
The Golden Bears grabbed the first lead, hitting RBI singles in the top of the first and the top of the second to put themselves up 2–0. But BC responded in the bottom of the second, as Gunnar Johnson hit an RBI single down the right-field line to score Surowiec from second base and cut Cal’s lead to one.
With two outs on the board, Olmstead stepped up to bat and sent a homer over the left-field wall to put Cal back up two. A.J. Colarusso closed the inning with a strikeout on the next at-bat, however, and that was the last run the Golden Bears put on the board all afternoon.
Colarusso gave up just two hits in the fifth and sixth innings. BC’s offense wasn’t finding the same success, though, leaving three runners on base in the bottom of the sixth as the game went into the seventh frame with BC down 3–1.
Gonzalez relieved Colarusso in the top of the seventh. He started by giving up a walk, but followed that up with three straight outs. The Eagles were finally able to get going offensively in the bottom of the frame, tying the game 3–3 with some help from Cal—two errors allowed both Solier and Mainolfi to cross home plate before the inning ended.
Gonzalez pitched a one-two-three inning in the eighth, and a two-out RBI single from Larson in the bottom of the frame gave BC its first lead of the day at 4–3.
With a critical ninth inning ahead, Gonzalez once again took the mound. He allowed two singles in the frame, but BC got Olmstead out at second base to end the Golden Bears’ chances at a win and begin the weekend 1–0.
(Anatoly Guz / Heights Staff)