KANNAPOLIS, NC – The University of Rochester baseball team saw its 2023 season start up with a narrow 8-7 loss at the hands of Christopher Newport University on Friday morning at the Division III Baseball Showcase at Atrium Health Park.
Christopher Newport (8-0) remains unbeaten on the young season, while Rochester falls to 0-1 after its opener, which was the earliest season opener in Rochester baseball history.
The Yellowjackets held 4-0 and 7-2 leads in the game, but the Captains were able to rally against the Rochester bullpen, getting four tallies in the fifth inning and single runs in the seventh and ninth innings to earn the win.
CNU's Josh Reinhold provided the game-winning walk-off hit, driving in pinch-hitter Ayden Stuffel in the ninth off
Mark Aaronson.
Rochester was led offensively by graduate student
Joseph Rende and first-year
Colton Avera who both were 3-for-5 at the plate. Rende finished with three RBI and a run scored while Avera clubbed two doubles, drove in two RBI and added a run.
Senior
Aaron Whitley was 2-for-4 with two runs and a stolen base, with
Jackson Reed scoring three times.
On the mound,
Trevor Van Allen got the start and went four innings with two unearned runs allowed. He allowed two hits, walked three and struck out a pair. Relievers
Thomas Karpishin and Sammy Rosenfied each stuck out two and gave up a run each, with
Jason Cobert getting tagged for four runs.
UR got the early lead, scoring twice in the top of the first inning. Whitley reached on a single and Reed was hit by a pitch to put two on with nobody out. Rende drove in Whitley for the first run of the year for the Yellowjackets with a single to center, moving Reed to third. A few batters later, Reed scampered home on a Captains passed ball.
Two innings later, the lead doubled. Avera laced a two-bagger to right center scoring Reed.
John Moses followed with an RBI hit, boosting the Yellowjackets lead to 4-0.
Christopher Newport got a pair of runs back in the third thanks to a couple Rochester fielding miscues.
Rochester answered back though, plating three runs in the fourth to jump ahead 7-2. Rende singled in Reed and Whitley with a base hit. He eventually came around on Avera's RBI double down the left field line.
In the fifth, CNU scored four runs, pulling within one. Kevin Mackmin doubled in two runs, Ethan Weaver singled in another and Sam Benedict provided another run with his single to right.
During the seventh, Reinhold drew a bases loaded walk to pull the Captains even, setting up his dramatic walk-off in the ninth.
Rochester is back in action later on Friday afternoon against #6 Marietta in the second of three games at the D3 Showcase event being hosted by the Kannapolis Cannon Ballers, a single-A affiliate of the MLB's Chicago White Sox.
