University of Connecticut Athletics
University of Connecticut
ECU
Huskies Fall In American Championship Game, 4-3
5/26/2018 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
CLEARWATER, Fla. - The No. 22 UConn baseball team battled but ultimately fell 4-3 in Saturday's American Athletic Conference Championship game against No. 15 ECU at Spectrum Field. UConn sits at 35-20-1 and awaits the NCAA Selection Show on Monday, May 28 at noon on ESPNU.
The Huskies handed the ball to redshirt senior Trevor Holmes for his first career start. The veteran delivered with a career-high 4.1 innings, allowed four hits and just one earned run.
The Huskies squandered a major opportunity in the top of the third with the bases loaded and no-one out. Back-to-back singles from John Toppa and Anthony Prato, followed by a hit by pitch to Zac Susi got the rally going. But Jake Agnos struck out the next three Huskies to get out of the jam.
ECU was able to get to UConn reliever CJ Dandeneau in the fifth with three-straight RBI singles to take the 3-0 advantage.
UConn answered in the top of the sixth with the first three Huskies reaching base. Troy Stefanski led off with a base hit to right-center and came home on Chris Winkel's hit to right that put the Huskies on the board. Conor Moriarty's sacrifice fly to center brought in Michael Woodworth from third to get the Huskies within a run, 3-2.
ECU made it 4-2 in the bottom of the sixth on Turner Brown's sacrifice fly but the Huskies cut into the deficit to one in the top of the eighth when Troy Stefanski drew a leadoff walk, stole second and came home on Christian Fedko's double down the leftfield line to make it 4-3.
Anthony Prato led the Huskies with a three-hit performance to boost his tournament numbers to 12-for 18 (.667), coming up one hit shy of tying former UConn shortstop Bryan Daniello with a tournament-record 13 hits in 2016. The performance landed Prato on the All-Tournament team for the second straight year.
Troy Stefanski and Jacob Wallace also earned nods to the All-Tournament team with their performances in Clearwater.
The Huskies await the reveal of the 16 host sites for the regional rounds of the NCAA Championship on Sunday night at 8:30 p.m. on NCAA.com with the Huskies in the running to potentially host at Dodd Stadium in Norwich, Conn.
Notes
Zac Susi extended his reach base streak to 45 games with a hit by pitch in the third inning.
Trevor Holmes made his first career start and logged a career-high 4.1 innings.
Anthony Prato has recorded 23 hits in nine career games in The American Championship.
