BOCA RATON, Fla. – Looking to take the first bite in the final regular season series, Lynn University's baseball team did just that with a 10-2 victory over Nova Southeastern on Friday. The Fighting Knights belted out 16 hits as seven of their starters posted multi-hit games. Andrew Virgili logged his 10th quality start of the season while Austin Smith reached base for the 23rd consecutive game. Lynn improves to 25-22 overall and 9-13 in the Sunshine State Conference.
It was a two-out double by Anthony Boza that got LU going in the bottom of the first inning. The junior first baseman lifted a 1-2 fastball into the gap in left center and beat a throw home when Richie McVey singled through the right side of the infield.
The Knights used two big innings to pull away from the Sharks (32-15, 16-6 SSC). A four-run second made it a 5-0 Lynn lead. Kyle Radzewski drove in the first run of the frame with a double down the right field line, then scored two batters later off of Mike Diorio's perfectly placed bunt single that hugged the third base chalk. Dane Derstine concluded the Blue & White scoring in the second with a two-run single up the middle, the first two of three RBI on the day.
Virgili (7-5) upped his team-leading strikeout total to 94 on the season after fanning seven Sharks in 7.2 innings of work. His 94 Ks are the eighth most for a single season at Lynn while his 2.35 earned-run average is sixth best.
The Knight's offense kept humming along in the fifth when they loaded the bases twice and scored four more times. Johnny Broderick recorded his second hit of the afternoon to drive in the first run while Alex Bello followed by knocking in his first RBI of the game with a sacrifice fly to deep right field.
Lynn used the squeeze play for the second time in the game with Radzewski laying one down the first base line to score Steven Fernandez before Austin Smith hit a RBI double to make it 9-0.
Bello brought home the final run for LU in the bottom of the seventh when he launched a double off the right center field wall to plate Broderick for the third time.
Nova Southeastern was stymied for much of the game but took advantage of an error in the eighth to score two unearned runs.
The Blue & White close out their series with the Sharks with a noon double-header on Saturday. Fans can follow the action live by logging on to www.LynnFightingKnights.com and selecting "Game Central."
