Bongiovanni Pitches Hurricanes Past The Citadel, 6-1
March 1, 2003
CORAL GABLES, Fla. – The University of Miami baseball team improved its record to 8-3 on he season with a 6-1 win over The Citadel in front of 2,908 fans at Mark Light Stadium Saturday night.
Jim Burt was once again the leader offensively for Miami, going 2-for-3 at the plate. He extend team-best hitting streak to seven games, including five straight multiple-hit games. Burt’s averaged has jumped to .450.
On the hill, UM starter Vince Bongiovanni threw a career-high 7.1 innings, striking out five and walking two batters to improve to 3-1 on the season. He lowered his ERA to 1.48 over 24.1 innings of work. Left-hander Andrew Cohn and right-hander Shawn Valdes-Fauli came in to close out the eighth inning. George Huguet saw his first action of the season, working a perfect ninth inning. It was the 85th career relief appearance for Huget, which ranks ninth all time at UM.
The Hurricanes tacked on three more runs in the bottom of the fifth inning, highlighted by Ryan Braun’s second home run in as many nights and his third round-tripper of the season. With one runner on base, Braun drilled a 2-2 fastball deep over the left field fence. Second baseman Adam Ricks singled home the first run of the inning prior to Braun’s home run.
A two-out walk to Jim Burt came around to score UM’s sixth run of the night. Gaby Sanchez and Richard Giannotti produced back-to-back singles to score Burt. Giannotti went 2-for-3 on the night with a double and one RBI.
Left-fielder Tom Shannon skied a John Ellis offering high into short left-center field that fell in between the Citadel’ shortstop, center fielder and left fielder for a double to open the bottom half of the third inning. Shannon moved to third on Greg Dini’s fly ball to the right fielder in foul ground. After Paco Figueroa was hit by a pitch, Danny Figueroa laid down a perfect safety-squeeze bunt to score Shannon and give the Canes a 1-0 lead.
UM added to the lead in the third inning with a two-out RBI double by Richard Giannotti. The double was the third of the season for Giannotti, who doubled twice last night while playing his first game of the season.
The Citadel got to Bongiovanni in the fifth inning, as Chris Ard led off with a bunt single down the third-base line. Brook Dantzler advanced Ard with a sacrifice bunt before Matt Matulia singled moving Ard to third base. Jon Aughey collected the Bulldogs’ third hit of the inning to score Ard. Bongiovanni got out of the inning with a double play.
The Hurricanes and Bulldogs will play the series finale at 1 p.m. Sunday, March 2, at Mark Light Field. For more information on UM athletics, visit the official UM web site at hurricanesports.com.
