By Joseph Manniello
After Saturday's doubleheader sweep and Rutgers' two losses to Notre Dame, SJU had sole possession of third place in the Big East.
Now St. John's (33-18, 15-8 Big East) will have to play its best ball this weekend at Pittsburgh if it hopes to receive a tourney invite for the first time since 1999.
“The goal of every weekend is to win two out of three, but we really should have won this game,” senior shortstop Mike Rozema said. “It's still in our hands. If we play well next weekend we should be in good shape.”
For the third straight game, SJU fell behind early as Seton Hall (15-32-1, 7-16) took an early 3-0 lead and always seemed to have an answer when the home team struck closer. St. John's scored twice in the fourth and seventh innings, but it found itself one run short each time.
In six of the nine innings, the Hall's leadoff batter reached base successfully, while the home team left eight men on base.
“A big hit here and a big hit there,” said Rozema, “we would be talking about three wins now.”
With two outs and runners on the corner in the second inning, Anthony DeRosa struck out swinging. Three innings later, with the Johnnies trailing 3-2, Rozema led things off with a bunt single but Chris Joachim followed by grounding into a 5-4-3 double play.
“I'm not happy with the team's performance today,” said St. John's coach Ed Blankmeyer, a former associate head coach at Seton Hall for 14 years. “We left a lot of runners stranded. We gave Joe Scott a lot of easy early innings.”
Scott went eight innings, allowed 10 hits, struck out six and walked four. His counterpart, Anthony Varvaro, fell to 7-3 after allowing three runs (one earned) over five and a third innings. He struck out seven Pirates but walked five.
SJU struck after the seventh-inning stretch as Greg Thomson, who said he was having “a horrible at-bat up until that point,” connected on a 3-and-2 fastball for a two-run blast that cut the lead to one.
With runners on first and second in the eighth and SJU down 6-4, Rozema drove one deep to right center. The ball stayed up just enough for SHU right fielder Brandon Cohen to make a running grab.
What was going through the minds of the 500 fans in attendance, as well as that of Rozema?
“That it was a double,” he said. “That it was a tie game.”
Instead, Bryan Haggerty recorded his first save of the season after forcing pinch hitter Eddie Shultz into a game-ending double play.
Not knowing if his team will qualify for the annual tourney, Blankmeyer called it scary, considering St. John's has lost only one Big East series this season.
“You're going to have to win your way in. Nobody's going to help,” he said, noting how his squad has the toughest series of any remaining team looking to secure a spot. “Our objective is to win two out of three. Is that going to be good enough? I don't know.”
St. John's 7, Seton Hall 3. Behind six innings from Joe Reid and a 4-for-4 effort courtesy of Chris Joachim, St. John's completed the double-dip sweep Saturday.
Reid struck out eight and allowed two earned runs on seven hits. Joachim's two-run single to right turned a 3-2 deficit into a one run lead as SJU never looked back.
St. John's 4, Seton Hall 3. Joe Burke, who went 3-for-4 with two RBIs, hit a run-scoring single in the bottom of the eighth inning to propel the Storm to a come-from-behind win.
Closer Craig Hansen improved to 2-1 on the season after throwing 2.1 innings and giving up one run on four hits with one walk and three strikeouts.
Reach contributing writer Joseph Manniello by e-mail at TimesLedger@aol.com or call 718-229-0300, Ext. 143.
