Behind four home runs, including three from junior infielder Cort Maynard, the North Carolina A&T trounced the Canisius Golden Griffins, 16-4, on Saturday afternoon in non-conference baseball action inside War Memorial Stadium.
The win improves A&T to 9-9 and clinches the series victory.
“I said it yesterday after the game. We had to come out and want to win the series,” said A&T coach Ben Hall, who secured his 150th career win. “Today was definitely a day where everything is going right for you, and everything is going your way. But you look throughout the game, and it wasn’t all easy.
It was a lot of two-strike hits, a lot of two-out knocks. We played a clean defensive game, and that was big. We got a good start from (right-handed pitcher Logan Jarosz), and we did everything well today.”
Jarosz (W, 2-2) went 6.1 innings and allowed just three runs with five strikeouts. It was the longest outing of his young career.
The A&T bats got going quickly for Jarosz, with the offense scoring one or more runs over the first four innings.
Sophomore designated hitter Camden Jackson continued his recent hot hitting, doubling off the wall in right center with runners at the corners to score both Brantley and Bussey in the home first. The Aggies move to 6-0 on the year when they score in the first inning and 6-2 when they are the first team to plate a run.
Junior outfielder Cameran Brantley turned in a 2-for-2 day, including his second-inning triple down the right field line that scored graduate Alec Seaton, giving A&T a 3-0 lead. Two more runs came across in the third courtesy of sophomore outfielder TJ Ash’s first career home run, which left over the right field wall in a hurry.
The Aggies plated three additional runs in the fourth inning, highlighted by Maynard’s two-run blast, a sign of things to come in the game.
A&T extended its lead to 10-0 on a pair of RBI singles in the sixth from Jackson and junior infielder Anthony Hennings.
Canisius (7-9) finally got on the board in the seventh with a five-hit, three-run frame to cut the deficit to seven, 10-3. But A&T responded promptly with four runs in the home half.
With freshman catcher Canyon Brown on second base, Brantley smoked his second double of the day down the right field line to bring Brown around to score. The frame also featured another two-run bomb from Maynard.
Maynard left the yard a final time in the next inning, tattooing a fastball near the scoreboard in left field and scoring sophomore infielder Alex Reyna for a 16-3 advantage.
Maynard now has six homers on the season, and he pulled to within one of the team lead in RBI with 16.
Seven A&T batters had multi-hit games, led by Maynard’s 3-for-6, three-home run, six-RBI performance.
“There was a time here that you would’ve thought 150 would never come,” said Hall reflecting on his young coaching career. “But that’s not nearly enough. We want more, so we will continue to build on this. We have to wake up tomorrow and come finish this series off at home and continue to get better every day and try to rack up as many as we can get.”