MANSFIELD, Conn. – The Eastern Connecticut State University baseball pitching staff shut out the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth over the first 15 innings as the Warriors remaining unbeaten in the Little East Conference with 2-0, 6-5 victories Saturday afternoon at the Eastern Baseball Stadium.
 
The conference home sweep is the second in four days for Eastern (10-1, 6-0 LEC), which has played all of its games at home thus far. UMass (1-5, 1-3 LEC) has dropped its last four this year and its last four against Eastern.
 
In the opener, senior righty Josh Vincent (New London) and sophomore righty Nathan Furino (East Haven) combined on a six-hit shutout with 11 strikeouts, and sophomore righty Billy Oldham (Brookfield) carried a 4-0 lead into the seventh inning of the second game before the Corsairs got on the board for the first time on the afternoon with two runs on three hits, chasing Oldham in the process.
 
UMass cut a 6-2 deficit to one with two more runs in the eighth on three more hits, then, as the home team, scored an unearned run in the ninth to make it 6-5 and loaded the bases before junior righty Zach Player (East Hampton) ended the game with a swinging strikeout.
 
Eastern pitchers earned their first career saves, with Furino fanning four and allowing only one hit to ensure Vincent's third win without a loss, and Player getting the final two outs on strikeouts to back Oldham's second win in two decisions.
 
On the day, six Eastern pitchers combined to strike out 22 batters (11 in each game). Oldham, who scattered four hits and struck out seven while being charged with two earned runs, failed to start off the 25 batters he faced with a strike only seven times, going to full counts only twice. He retired the first eight batters he faced and 18 of the first 20. Vincent threw 110 pitches (70 for strikes) before giving way to Furino, who found the plate on 21 of his 35 offerings.
 
In two games for Eastern, senior Jack Rich (Meriden) reached six times with two doubles, two singles and two walks, and junior Noah Plantamuro (Bristol) reached five times with a double, three singles and a walk.  Each had two RBI. Junior catcher Matt Malcom (East Lyme) reached four times with two singles ,a walk and hit-by-pitch and also drove in two runs. Senior John Mesagno (Tappan, NY) reached three times with a double, two singles and walk and scored two runs.
 
Defensively, junior shortstop Owen Marica (Haddam) handled ten chances without an error.
 
In addition to 18 hits, Eastern reached 14 times on walks and hit-by-pitch, but stranded 20 (13 in the second game).
 
Senior righty Ryan Bruning matched Vincent in the first game, allowing only six hits and both runs while fanning seven and walking only one, throwing 67 of his 99 pitches for strikes. However, five pitches gave up 11 hits, walked eight and hit two batters.
 
 UMass No. 3 hitter DJ Perron, a sophomore, had five of his team's 15 hits on the day, two of them doubles.
 
Eastern hosts Johnson & Wales University Tuesday at 4 p.m. in a non-conference game.