After an ugly loss to a previously winless Lafayette squad on Friday in the series opener, NC State came alive late on both Saturday and Sunday to secure the series win over the Leopards in the Wolfpack’s final non-conference regular season series of the season. State improves to 14-2 on the year while Lafayette drops to 1-9.
The Pack jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the 1st inning on Saturday behind a Dalton Bargo bomb in his first plate appearance back from injury.
That was all the offense the Wolfpack could muster until the 6th inning, but it turned out that was all they really needed with Jacob Dudan on the bump. Dudan (6.2 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 10 K) dominated on the day, exiting in the 7th after tallying 115 pitches. Collins Black (2.1 IP, 1 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, 1 HBP) finished off the game in shaky fashion, but by that point the Pack was so far ahead it didn’t really matter. Black earned the save despite the rough outing as the game was within three runs when he entered.
Mikey Ryan led off the bottom of the 6th with a solo shot that exited the ballpark and landed on Lee Field out behind the left field wall.
State then blew the game open in the 7th. Brayden Fraasman singled with one out, which was followed by a Ryan HBP and a Drew Lanphere walk. Rett Johnson plated Fraasman with a sacrifice fly and then Ty Head brought home three runs with a line drive towards the scoreboard.
The Pack plated three more in the 8th. Luke Nixon singled with one away, stole second base, and scored on a Fraasman single up the middle. After walks to Ryan and Rett, Head singled home Fraasman and Ryan to make it a 10-1 game.
Teddy Cashman, son of Yankees GM Brian Cashman, hit a pinch-hit three-run homer in the top of the 9th to make the good-buddy final of the 10-4 Wolfpack win.
Head (2-for-4, HR, R, 5 RBI, 2 BB, 2-2 SB) and Fraasman (3-for-5, 2 R, RBI, 2-2 SB) led the way offensively in the game. Chris McHugh (1-for-4, R, 2 BB), Bargo (1-for-3, HR, R, 2 RBI, 2 BB), Ryan (1-for-3, HR, 3 R, RBI, BB, HBP), and Rett Johnson (0-for-1, RBI, 2 BB, HBP, SF, 2-2 SB) also reached base safely multiple times on Saturday.
Sunday was another slow bleeder of a State victory. There was no scoring until the 3rd inning, despite State putting a runner aboard in each of the first two frames. Lafayette tallied the first run of the game on an infield single from Brandon Doubek, a sacrifice bunt, fielding error, walk, and a Matt Colella single to left field.
The Pack responded quickly in the bottom half of the inning with Preston Bonn, making just his second career start, emphatically homering to lead off.
Attempting to assault his fellow students out on the Lee Field grass was a common theme of the day for Bonn, one we will get back to in a bit. Another common theme to the day was Bargo grounding into double plays. The Tennessee transfer did exactly that three times on Sunday, with the one in the 3rd inning at least being slow enough to allow a run to score. Rett followed the Bonn bomb with a ground-rule double, advanced on a Head flyout, and then scored on the Bargo twin-killer to put State ahead 2-1.
Bode Grieve homered for the second time in the series for Lafayette in the top of the 4th to the tie the game, and State responded in kind with a 4-run 4th to take the lead back. Nixon, Fraasman, Ryan, and Bonn all walked in succession with one out to plate a run and push State back in the lead. Rett then hit an infield single to second base to score another run, Head reached on an RBI fielder’s choice, and McHugh singled in another run. That made it a 6-2 game with the Pack in firm control.
With Cooper Consiglio (6.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 8 K) dealing on the mound, that was all the Pack would need for the day. Consiglio picked up his second win of the season on the day.
For good measure, State plated four more in the 5th and three more runs in the 6th. Sherman Johnson led off the 5th with a HBP and scored on a Nixon triple off the right field wall. Ryan plated Nixon on a one-out single, advanced to third base on a Bonn double, then scored after back-to-back walks to Rett and Head. McHugh reached on a fielder’s choice to plate Bonn.
Speaking of Bonn, he mashed 3-run bomb in his next plate appearance to make it a 13-2 game, scoring Sherman and Nixon.
A Ryan Stoddard 2-run home run in the top of the 7th extended the game momentarily, but Brandon Novy put the game away with a jack that cleared the batters eye in center field, an estimated 440-foot shot. The home run enacted the mercy/slaughter/run rule, with the 14-4 final score.
Bonn (3-for-3, 2B, 2 HR, 4 R, 5 RBI, BB) was clearly the star of the day. Joining the redshirt freshman in having multiple hits in the game were McHugh (2-for-4, RBI, BB) and Rett Johnson (2-for-3, 2B, R, RBI, BB). Sherman Johnson (1-for-3, 2 R, HBP, 1-1 SB), Nixon (1-for-2, 3B, 3 R, RBI, 2 BB), Fraasman (1-for-2, R, BB, SH), and Ryan (1-for-3, 2 R, RBI, BB) all reached base safely multiple times in the game.
Tristan Potts made his season debut on the mound to start the 7th, but had a rough go of it (0.0 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, o BB, o K). Danny Heintz (1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K) came on to finish off the 7th.
A common theme for the weekend was men left on base for the Pack, with State leaving 7 on Friday, a whopping 13 on Saturday, and 5 on Sunday. Lafayette, meanwhile, left just 8 men on base total across all three games. Then again, it’s a positive sign that State was getting men on, and you’re naturally going to have more LOB when you out-hit an opponent 32-to-19 in a series. However, if the Wolfpack are to have success in ACC play, they’ll need to push more of those guys across.
Being challenged across all three games of a series against a previously winless Patriot League squad is not an encouraging sign with a weekend series coming up against a Boston College team that just went down to Miami and took two-of-three from the Hurricanes.
There are still questions to be answered with ACC approaching. First, the Pack will take on Elon in Raleigh Tuesday at 3:00pm.
