Kelly, Dukes Edge Northeastern

Saturday, March 31

Harrisonburg, Va.

4 p.m.

James Madison University

14-11, 2-3

Northeastern

13-10, 1-1

Northeastern

James Madison

3/31/2018 9:11:00 PM | Baseball

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HARRISONBURG, Va. – Sophomore Kevin Kelly struck out a career-high nine batters to help James Madison secure a 6-3 victory over Northeastern in Colonial Athletic Association baseball at Eagle Field on Saturday evening.

The Dukes (14-11, 2-3 CAA) ended a three-game skid and evened the weekend series against the Huskies (13-10, 1-1 CAA) at one apiece.

Kelly improved to 2-2 on the season by throwing 6.2 innings, giving up two runs on seven hits. Sophomore Brett Ayer took the ball in the ninth and earned his first career save with his scoreless performance.

Sophomore Matt Dipasupil took charge for the Dukes at the plate, turning in a 3-for-4 performance, his second three-hit game of the season, with a run scored, a career-high tying two RBIs and his first career extra-base hit. Freshmen Michael Morgan and Josh Jones both added two hits with a run scored and an RBI each.

JMU took a 3-0 lead after the third inning when sophomore Harry Brown drew a bases-loaded walk that drove in a run, followed by Jones hitting an RBI single through the left side and Morgan hitting a sacrifice fly to right field. Dipasupil's double that bounced off the right field wall scored two for the Dukes in the sixth to increase their lead to 5-0.

Back-to-back infield singles by Northeastern in the seventh scored a run each to reduce JMU's lead to 5-2. In the eighth, the Huskies knocked in their last run off a solo shot to left field before sophomore DaVonn Griffin answered in the bottom half of the eighth with a RBI double to left center field, leading to the final score, 6-3.

QUICK HITS
- Senior Adam Sisk tallied a hit in the game, moving his streak of reaching base to 21 games
- Jones' two-hit performance marked his team-high eighth two-hit outing of the season
- JMU is 10-1 (1-0 CAA) when it scores first in the ball game and 9-2 (1-1 CAA) when it has more hits than its opponents

QUOTING COACH IKE
"I could not be more proud of Kevin Kelly getting us deep in the ball game and striking out nine batters. Give credit to our bullpen in Shelton Perkins and Ayer for coming in and keeping the game intact. Our guys fought hard every at-bat especially Dipasupil with his big double in the sixth and Griffin's double late in the game to add a little cushion to our lead. Overall, just happy with the way our guys played tonight."

UP NEXT
James Madison will play the series finale on Sunday at noon at Eagle Field.