Knights

Tuesday, July 2, 2024

By: Dan Allison | Silver Knights media relations

A resounding win over the first-place Norwich Sea Unicorns on Sunday put wind in the Silver Knights’ sails as Nashua set course for their July schedule. Looking for a push to help climb the Futures League standings, the Knights headed to Westfield for a doubleheader with a chance to open their week with two wins on one night.

Nashua pulled off a big 4-3 win in game one, behind a home-run derby tiebreaker win from Rutgers’ Owen Carey and UMass Lowell’s River Hart. Despite the win, the Knights squandered a chance for a sweep as they fell in game two 10-4 to split the night. 

Game One

Westfield has not been a welcoming place to the Knights so far this season. Along with rainouts and postponements pushing off Nashua’s June trips to western Massachusetts, their lone trip ended in a 5-4 loss. Tuesday night began to look much of the same, with the Starfires jumping out to a 2-0 lead.

Penn State’s Will Perkowski was great in the opening two frames, but the Starfires cracked his code in the third with two runs to take the early lead. 

Quiet at-bats filled the scorecard for the Knights to start, all until Rutgers’ Owen Carey got the home run show started early at Bullens Field. With help from Northeastern’s AJ Aschettino, who singled with two outs in the inning in what was a two-hit Nashua debut for him, Carey plastered a ball to deep right field that left the yard in a hurry. After four and a half, it was 2-2.

Westfield wasted no time responding to the homer, but the Knights quickly showed that two can play that game. After a run in the bottom of the fifth to make it 3-2 ‘Fires, Endicott’s TJ Liponis knocked in Central Michigan’s Drew Loikits after a base hit of his own to tie it up once again.

Nashua’s bullpen had to step up with the game entering the late stages, especially in a seven-inning contest. Wake Forest’s Andrew Koshy took over on the bump in the sixth and quickly took over in the game overall. Koshy tossed two and ⅓ innings of no-hit baseball as he struck out four to push the games to a derby tiebreaker.

Homering just an hour ago, the Knights turned to Carey to step up to the dish. Following a few pop-ups and deep flyballs, Carey crushed one to crack the scoreboard with one homer. Nashua called a timeout to bring in River Hart, the league leader in home runs. 

Playing a sort of “closer” roll in this derby, Hart came in and delivered two mammoth shots to bring Nashua’s total to three. Westfield came up next and got their first homer early, but nothing else came following as the Knights took the extra-time win.

Game Two

In the main event of the evening, the Knights would once again put up a four-run performance. However, Westfield took out their game-one frustrations on the scoreboard in a 10-run outing for the Starfires.

In almost reverse fashion of game one, it was the Knights who struck first to take the lead. Owen Carey stayed hot in the nightcap with two RBI singles in the first and second, including a two-RBI knock. Nashua would push another run across on a wild pitch to make it 4-0, looking for their first doubleheader sweep of the season.

Westfield, who split a doubleheader at Holman just a short week ago, wasn’t going to let the Knights steal two from them at home. Nashua’s hot start was instantly answered by the Starfires putting up bingo numbers in the next two frames. Three in the third, one in the fourth, and a whopping five-run frame in the fifth inning. 

No late offense push would be enough for the Knights to crawl back into it, with the shortened seven-inning matchup cutting Nashua’s time to rally short. Westfield took the win 10-4, giving Nashua their third doubleheader split of the summer