Harvard Finds Hitting Groove

Coming off a Sunday doubleheader in which it was only able to muster five total runs, the Harvard baseball team was due for an offensive explosion.

The Crimson got what it was looking for yesterday afternoon, scoring in six innings to win a wild 13-12 victory over Northeastern at Friedman Diamond.

Sophomore infielder Jeff Reynolds was 5-of-5 with seven RBI to lead an offensive attack that was highlighted by a five-run fifth inning.

Junior Dillon O’Neill added two hits and three runs, classmate Sean O’Hara scored four times, and senior Dan Zailskas had three hits for Harvard. Seven players in all had at least one hit for the Crimson.

“It was pretty important to bounce back and get on the right track,” O’Neill said.

The Harvard offense got on the board in the first when freshman Greg Davey walked, advanced to third on a failed pickoff attempt and a throwing error, and scored on a sacrifice fly by O’Hara.

The Huskies responded by taking the lead in the bottom of the first, when sophomore Matt Miller doubled to center field and was tripled in by senior David Gustafon. Gustafon would later score on an RBI groundout.

But the Crimson tied things up in the top of the second on an RBI double by Zailskas, while freshman pitcher Matt Doyle held Northeastern scoreless in the bottom half of the inning.

Both teams added two runs in the third frame. Harvard staged a two-out rally capped by a Reynolds triple into the left-center gap that scored O’Hara and sophomore Marcus Way.

“Everybody was having really good at-bats today,” Reynolds said. “We were putting balls in play, and they were getting through.”

After the teams went scoreless through the fourth, the Crimson offense took off again in the top of the fifth inning. O’Neill started it up with a walk against Huskie reliever Kevin Ferguson, scoring one batter later when freshman Danny Moskovits tripled him in. After an O’Hara walk, Reynolds singled in Moskovits, and junior Tyler Albright then doubled to right center to score two. Albright advanced to third on a balk, then scored on junior Sam Franklin sacrifice fly to give Harvard a 9-4 lead.

“I think we have a lot of good hitters as a team; where we get in trouble on offense is when we swing at pitcher’s pitches instead of waiting for our pitch to hit,” O’Neill said. “I think the fifth inning is a good example of us being patient at the plate, not getting ourselves out, and waiting for the right pitch to hit.”

But the pesky Huskies fought back in the bottom of the fifth with a Ryan Maguire two-run double down the left field line, putting them back in the game at 9-6.  The runs continued to pile up in the sixth inning. With the bases loaded, Reynolds connected once again for a single that would drive in two more Crimson runs.

With the score 11-6, Northeastern scored four times in the bottom half of the inning to bring itself within one.

Neither team recorded a hit in the seventh, but O’Neill led off the eighth for Harvard with a single through the left side. After O’Hara was intentionally walked and Way struck out, Reynolds continued his clutch performance with a two-out, two-RBI single to right that scored O’Neill and O’Hara, and gave the Crimson a 13-10 lead heading into the bottom of the inning.

“I just put it where they weren’t, and you get lucky sometimes,” Reynolds said.

But the Huskies had a response of their own, picking up two runs in the bottom of the eighth. Freshman Logan Gillis doubled down the leftfield line off Way, scoring two and putting Northeastern down by only a run as the teams headed into the ninth. Harvard was unable to pick up an insurance run, stranding two on base. But sophomore Conner Hulse was able to hold off a Northeastern rally, stranding two baserunners and getting the save to conclude the wild affair. Way earned the win with 2.2 innings of relief.

Reynolds’ five hits brought his season average up to .396. He also had two steals and missed a cycle by just a home run.

The game saw 28 hits in total, each team with 14 apiece.

It was the second consecutive high-scoring game between the two teams. Last season, the Crimson topped the Huskies, 16-13, in the squad’s final game of the 2009 season.

“It’s always a wild one with those guys,” Reynolds said.