MANSFIELD, Conn. – Freshman pitchers John Parker (Brunswick, ME) and Nick Rascati (Wallingford) combined on a six-hitter and first-year junior centerfielder Alex Zachary (Enfield) drove in two runs with a game-tying sacrifice fly and eighth-inning single to lift the Eastern Connecticut State University baseball team to a 6-1 Little East Conference victory over Western Connecticut State University Tuesday afternoon at the Eastern Baseball Stadium.

The win by Eastern (14-9, 5-2 LEC) – coupled with losses the University of Southern Maine and Plymouth State University – moves the Warriors into a three-way tie for first place in the conference. The Warriors snap a four-game losing streak with their ninth straight win in the series with Western (11-14, 3-4) after improving their home record to 6-1. The Colonials  have dropped five of their last seven.

The right-handed Parker (3-2) pitched a career-high six innings and was lifted with a 3-1 lead after the first two batters of the seventh reached on an infield error and hit-by-pitch. A key play in the game came with Rascati facing his first batter, Joe Daigle. Daigle was called out on batter's interference for the first out when he made contact with Eastern senior catcher Tim Budd (Cheshire), who was attempting to pick  the runner off second base following Daigle's failed bunt attempt. Rascati then got senior rightfielder John Kelly to line into an inning-ending double play started by Eastern senior third baseman Chad Adams (Ware, MA) – the Warriors third double play of the game.

A lefty, Rascati earned his second save by allowing only one hit over the final three innings. He fanned three and walked one. Parker gave up three hits while fanning two and walking three.

Western senior lefty Edgard Santiago surrendered only two hits (both coming in the first inning) and carried a 1-0 lead into the fifth before the Warriors broke through on Zachary's game-tying sacrifice fly and a go-ahead RBI double from freshman DH Alex Parkos (Meriden). Junior rightfielder Pat Sirois (Cromwell) made it 3-1 when he poked a two-out RBI single to center after freshman leftfielder Alexander White (West Hartford) was intentionally walked with a runner on second. Budd's suicide squeeze off new pitcher CJ Angelo made it 4-1 in the seventh and the Warriors tacked on two unearned runs in the eighth, one coming home on Zachary's two-out single to right.

Adams and Parkos each had two hits in Eastern's eight-hit attack. Both of Parkos' hits were doubles. Adams, batting third in the order, had managed only one hit in his last 24 at-bats over the team's previous eight games before breaking out against Western. He reached safely four times in the game. He singled in the first, walked in the third, singled and scored in the fifth and reached on an infield error with two out in the eighth and scored on Zachary's single. 

Since hitting .483 through the first seven games of the season, Parkos was mired in a 3-for-39 slump until stroking three hits and driving in two runs in Saturday's LEC doubleheader at Plymouth State University.  After striking out in his first two at-bats against Western, he doubled in his next two before being lifted for a pinch runner in the seventh.

Batting leadoff, Kelly had two of Western's six hits and drove in the team's only run with a triple to left in the third. . Senior centerfielder Chris Callahan, the conference's second-leading hitter (.479) reached twice on walks and grounded out twice.

Eastern visits Brandeis University Wednesday at 3:30 in a non-conference makeup game from April 7.