Army West Point freshman pitcher Joe Santoro walked off the field with a sense of triumph as the batter hit the ball into the first baseman’s glove for Lehigh’s last out, sealing a road sweep for the Black Knights.
Lehigh baseball (11-18, 1-8 PL) lost each of its three games in the team’s weekend series against Army (16-14, 8-2 PL) at Ulrich Sports Complex April 7-8.
While the Mountain Hawks only had four hits in Saturday’s series-opener and were shut out 14-0 by the Black Knights, the team managed to score three runs on 10 hits in its 5-3 loss to conclude the double header.
Freshman outfielder Tyler Schreiner claimed two of the team’s runs and senior infielder and outfielder Chris Kersey contributed one in the second game.
Lehigh, however, never found its momentum, scoring only one run on seven hits in Army’s 10-1 victory in the third and final game of the series on Sunday.
The Black Knights scored 14 runs on 14 hits in the first game, burning through six Mountain Hawk pitchers in the process.
While Lehigh held Army to five runs off of 13 hits in the second game, the Black Knights ended the series on the same note they started with 10 runs on 11 hits.
Lehigh sophomore infielder Tony Gallo said he was disappointed in his team’s lack of offensive consistency.
“Collectively, we need to do a better job of stringing hits together,” Gallo said.
Gallo was the only Mountain Hawk who scored in the team’s third game of the series.
Coach Sean Leary said his team didn’t lose because of any one individual play. He said the Mountain Hawks will need to battle through the rest of their games this season to come up with wins.
Lehigh echoed its coach’s call for improvement, taking the loss upon itself and aiming to turn around its Patriot League play performance moving forward.
“We’re here to win,” sophomore pitcher Jason Reynolds said. “It’s that simple. When you’re 1-8 after your Patriot League play, all you can do is take it one game at a time.”
Though runs proved to be rare in the Mountain Hawks’ weekend series against Army, Leary said he believes that if his team sticks to its offensive system, it can produce at a high level and find momentum to finish the year on a high note.
Lehigh will have several more chances to improve its league record starting with the rescheduled game at rival Lafayette College April 10.
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