GREENSBORO, N.C. — An offensive onslaught with 21 base hits and five home runs gave the Castleton baseball team its first win of the season, a 17-12 defeat of Guilford.
The Spartans (1-1) received another four-hit outing from Tyler McLain while Jackson Cardozo also tallied four base knocks, just a double shy of the cycle. Addison Schaub, Reece de Castro, and Jesus Cardenas each collected a trio of hits as Schaub and Ryan Lawrence knocked in three RBIs apiece.
Joseph Voli got his second career win after toeing the rubber in relief, getting in 3.0 innings of work. Brayden Howrigan and Sam Crawford made their Spartan debuts as Stephen Coffey made his tenth career appearance to close it out. Each of the four Castleton hurlers logged a strikeout.
For the second game in a row, McLain stepped to the plate with two outs in the first inning and deposited a home run to left center. The 1-0 lead was overtaken by Guilford (1-3) in the home half as the Quakers plated two runs on two hits and a Spartan error.
The visitors punched back as leadoff hitter Jackson Cardozo catapulted his first career homer out of McBane Field to tie it 2-2. In starting pitcher Howrigan's second frame of work, he forced a trio of groundouts to keep the contest level.
Hunter Perkins doubled to lead off and McLain picked up a single to begin the third inning. Evan Keegan sent a sacrifice fly to right field, scoring Perkins in the process. Brandon Ramirez drew a walk, moving into scoring position as McLain took third on a passed ball. A Schaub single plated the sophomore duo, extending the advantage to three. The Quakers benefitted from four hits and five free bases in the bottom of the third, posting a seven-run stanza to lead 9-5.
When the Spartans came back up, facing a new pitcher, the bats ignited. Lawrence and de Castro got on via hit by pitch and base on balls, followed by Perkins with an RBI single. McLain picked up another base hit as Keegan came through with a sacrifice fly once again to plate Perkins after de Castro scored on a wild pitch. Cardozo singled to score McLain, then Cardenas picked up a hit to load the bases two batters later. Lawrence came back to the plate, took a wild pitch that scored a run, then hammered a three-run homer to make it 13-9 after the top of the fourth.
Voli sat down Guilford's next six hitters in order as his battery mate Schaub left the yard with a leadoff solo shot in the sixth frame. The junior right-hander gave way to Crawford in the bottom half of that inning as the home side scored a pair, cutting the Spartans' lead to three. An eighth-inning outburst increased the gap as Cardenas reached base and stole second – the team's first swipe of the year – as de Castro followed with a two-RBI blast. After McLain doubled, Keegan got plunked, and Cardozo singled, Ramirez came up with an RBI single to eclipse the 20-hit mark on the day.
Rylan Smith led off the home half of the eighth with a homer, but the Quakers could not overcome the five-run deficit as the Spartans bagged its first victory of the 2023 campaign.
De Castro, a fifth-year Spartan, became a member of the program's 100-hit club with a double in the fourth inning. The squad's 21 hits is the best single-game mark in over a decade (24 vs. Plattsburgh State, 4/14/2010), while five homers marks the highest total for Castleton since 2017.
The Spartans do battle with Guilford again tomorrow with a 2 p.m. first pitch.
