Florida Southern Edges Tritons in Non-Conference Contest

Box Score ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - The Eckerd baseball team wrapped up an 11-game home stand on Tuesday night falling to Florida Southern in a non-conference contest, 6-3.

The Tritons (6-12) got a solid start from Robin Allen and a two-run home run from Tom Buonopane, but a three-run fifth inning for the Mocs was a turning point in the game.

The game was scoreless through three innings as Allen twice worked out of situations of runners on first and second with one out.  In the fourth, FSC (11-6) put runners on second and third with one out but Allen was able to limit the damage by retiring the next two batters.  Austin Mauer's sacrifice fly brought in Omar Villeman from third before Allen got out of the inning.

Florida Southern took advantage of three Triton errors in the fifth to score three times for a 4-0 lead.

Eckerd finally broke through against FSC starter J.J. Niekro in the sixth.  Chase Achuff led off the inning with a double and moved to third on a one-out single by Nick Conti.  Sam Cochrane's sacrifice fly broke up Niekro's shutout bid, and Buonopane followed with a two-run blast over the left field fence to bring the Tritons within a run.

However, the Mocs scored twice in the top of the seventh before Joey Favetta entered in relief and got Eckerd out of the inning.

From there, a trio of FSC relievers closed the door allowing no hits over the final three innings while striking out five.

Allen (0-2) took the loss despite throwing four quality innings, allowing only one run on four hits with four strikeouts.  Favetta was fantastic in relief, throwing two hitless innings and fanning four batters.  Derek Lamensdorf worked the ninth and struck out the side in a scoreless inning.

Buonopane accounted for two of Eckerd's five hits.  Conti extended his streak of reaching base safely to 18 games with his single in the sixth.

Cochrane's 17-game hitting streak came to an end after a bad break turned what looked to be a single into an out when his line drive deflected off Niekro directly to FSC second baseman Pablo Cabrera.

The Tritons return to conference play this weekend, visiting Rollins for a three-game series.