WATERTOWN—For the second time this season, the Glens Falls Golden Eagles pitching staff held an opposing team scoreless for an entire game, defeating the Watertown Wizards 2-0 in game one of Monday's doubleheader.
First, Golden Eagles ace Nathan Forer (Southern Illinois), a junior, shutout the Saratoga Phillies back on June 11, for eight innings. Forer, whose perfect 4-0 record tops all New York Collegiate Baseball League pitchers this summer, pitches the second game of the doubleheader.
Today, freshman righty Tony Dischler (University of Louisiana at Monroe) tossed a complete-game shutout, pitching seven scoreless innings, striking out seven and allowing only four hits.
In four starts this season, Dischler sports a 2-1 win-loss record, and decreases his ERA to 3.89 this summer. Three of the four total hits Dischler allowed came in the games' first three innings.
With the win, Glens Falls improves to 17-5 on the season and continues to climb the Perfect Game Cross Check nationwide rankings of the top collegiate summer teams as they currently rank 19 in the top 25.
After a lead-off single in the Wizards' seventh inning gave Watertown their fourth and final hit of the afternoon, an inning-ending double-play ended the game and dropped the Wizards to a tie with the Mohawk Valley DiamondDawgs for fourth place in the East Division with a 12-12 win-loss record.
Glens Falls finished the game with two runs on five hits, compared to Watertown who mustered four hits and scored zero runs. Both teams committed zero errors, while the Wizards and DiamondDawgs lead the league with 45 total errors.
Despite the Golden Eagles leadoff batters reaching base in three innings, they were unable to score until the top half of the sixth.
After senior right fielder Anthony Giansanti (Siena) worked his 11th walk of the season, freshman left fielder Rodarrick Jones (New Orleans) readied himself for sacrifice bunt.
Glens Falls hitters struggled squaring up bunts all afternoon, but, as luck would have it, Jones opted to swing away and singled up the middle. Giansanti advanced to third, with Jones taking second on the throw.
Giansanti later scored his team-leading 20th run this season on a Wizards' wild-pitch for the games' first run. A sacrifice fly RBI from freshman shortstop Eric Phillips (Georgia Southern) scored Jones and put the Golden Eagles on top 2-0.
In his first at-bat in the first inning, Jones smoked a double to deep right. Jones' 26 hits trials Giansanti for the team lead, while his 17 runs scored is also second-best on the Golden Eagles roster behind Giansanti.
Both Jones and sophomore Chris Lashmet (Northwestern) each have hit seven doubles in 2009. Sophomore Nate Valdez (Central Arizona) added two hits of his own that upped his hit total to 12 in the 16 games he's started this summer. Freshmen Kevin Berry (New Orleans) also added his 12 hit on the season, with a single in the seventh.
Glens Falls plays Watertown again at 4:30 p.m. in the second game of the doubleheader.
Glens Falls (17-5) 000 002 0 — 2 5 0
Watertown (12-12) 000 000 0 — 0 4 0
WP — Dischler (2-1). LP — Kennedy (0-2). 2B — Jones (GF) (7).