UConn Baseball takes home a 9-1 win against Central Connecticut State University. This leaves them at 27-18 for the season. (Photo by Brandon Barzola/The Daily Campus)
UConn bounced back in a big way Tuesday afternoon in a 9-1 win over Central Connecticut, allowing just three hits on the day. The Huskies were fresh off their second-straight series loss that had been capped off by a walk-off home run on Sunday.
“I thought it was a really well-played game on our side,” head coach Jim Penders said. “The scoreboard should look like that at JOC. Would love to see it more often.”
The Huskies improve to 27-18 on the year after putting up nine runs on 15 hits while making zero fielding errors.
John Toppa got the scoring started when he sent a 2-1 pitch over the fence for a solo home run. Kyler Fedko extended his multi-hit game streak to three, and Thad Phillips followed with RBI singles, plating Anthony Prato and Michael Woodworth as part of a three-run first inning.
The bats would go quiet for a few innings before UConn put up another three-spot in the third. The youngest Fedko earned his second RBI when Prato tagged up on a long fly ball to left field. Woodworth tacked on another after CCSU’s Michael Delease misplayed a ground ball hit back to the mound. Chris Winkel took a 1-0 pitch the opposite way for an RBI double to make the score 6-1.
The last two runs of the day came in the next inning thanks to RBI singles from Woodworth and Christian Fedko, cementing the final score at 9-1.
Though Joe Simeone got the nod to start, Angus Mayock was the star on the mound. After Simeone finished his three innings of one run and five strikeouts, Mayock came in for three innings of his own.
The redshirt freshman allowed just one hit and struck out five. Penders said he even reached 94 miles per hour on the radar gun in his first career win.
“He was awesome,” Penders said on the young right-hander. “Coach Mac has been advocating for him since day one, thought he could be special. He’s just come along the last few outings. It’s been better and better.”
Karl Johnson, Jake Sanderson and Randy Polonia combined to get the last nine outs of the afternoon, with each throwing an inning. The trio struckout two, walked another pair and gave up a single hit, but the star of the day was Mayock, who has had back-to-back good outings following a two-out, no-hit performance against Sam Houston State over the weekend.
“He’s been a nice addition,” Penders said. “With Gardner going down, he’s seen a little daylight and made the most of his opportunities. He’s a guy we’re going to count on down the stretch for sure.”
The Huskies will welcome in the Wichita State Shockers this weekend for a three-game set. After losing a series in consecutive weekends for the first time this season, Penders said there’s one thing they need to get the weekend started right: “Mason Feole needs to be Mason Feole.”
Game 1 is set for Friday, May 3 at Dunkin Donuts Park in Hartford, with the first pitch coming in at 7:05 p.m.
Kevin Arnold is a campus correspondent for The Daily Campus. He can be reached via email at kevin.arnold@uconn.edu.
