MANSFIELD, Conn. –Senior right-hander Billy Oldham (Brookfield) pitched at least seven innings for the ninth time in 13 starts this year and senior centerfielder Ryan Bagdasarian (Glastonbury) hit a back-breaking two-run home run with two out in the fourth inning that carried the No. 1 nationally-ranked Eastern Connecticut State University baseball team to a 6-1 win over Rowan University in the first game of the best-of-three NCAA Division III Super Regional tournament Friday afternoon at the Eastern Baseball Stadium.

With its 17^th consecutive win – eighth straight in Little East Conference and NCAA tournament play – Rochester, NY Regional titlist Eastern (43-3) moves to within a win of qualifying for its 13^th NCAA Division III national tournament, June 3-8 at Cedar Rapids, IA. Rowan (33-9), the Annville, PA Regional champ, needs two wins to clinch its second straight – eighth overall – trip to the NCAA national tournament.
 

Originally scheduled to continue tournament action Saturday, Game 2 has been re-scheduled for Sunday at 11 a.m. at the Eastern Baseball Stadium due to expected rain Saturday. If needed, a second, decisive tournament game will follow 45 minutes after the completion of Game 2.

Oldham (10-2) became the 14^th pitcher in program history to win at least ten games in a season and ninth to strike out at least 100 in a campaign by pitching seven shutout innings, limiting the Profs to seven singles and a double while fanning seven and walking only two. Rowan had runners aboard in all but one inning against Oldham, but the first-team All-LEC pitcher stranded runners in scoring position three times as he lowered his ERA to 2.51.

Ranked in a tie for 11^th nationally with a team .341 batting average, Eastern jumped on unbeaten Rowan junior lefty Eli Atiya for two runs in the first on three hits a walk and sacrifice fly, added another to make it 3-0 in the second on two hits, a sacrifice bunt and throwing error and Bagdasarian's third home run in four games – a two-run shot that came after there were two out and none on – pushed the advantage to 5-1 after four innings.

Atiya was making his staff-high 12^th start of the season with an 8-0 record and staff-leading 1.85 ERA, but was reached for nine hits and was charged with all six Eastern runs before giving way to Mike Shannon with his team trailing, 6-1, with one out in the seventh.

Bagdasarian, who had hit a game-tying two-run, two-out home run in the ninth inning of the regional championship win over Middlebury College last weekend, has now hit safely in 17 games. In the last four games, he has driven in nine runs on only five hits, six of the runs coming on three two-run home runs.

Graduate All-America leftfielder John Mesagno (Tappan, NY) moved to within one hit of becoming the 19^th player in program history with 200 in a career. Mesagno had a sacrifice fly that drove in the second run of the first inning and followed with a one-out single in the third and a double that set up the team's final run in the fifth.

Senior catcher Matt Malcom (East Lyme) had given Eastern a 1-0 lead in the first with his team-high 57^th RBI of the season on a single that plated leadoff hitter Zach Donahue (South Windsor). Donahue scored his second run of the game by riding home on the front end of Bagdasarian's sixth home run of the season that came on the first pitch that he saw from Atiya. Atiya had retired the first two batters of the inning before Donahue singled to center on a 2-2 pitch.

 

Donahue, Bagdasarian and Mesagno all had two hits in Eastern's ten-hit attack, with Donahue scoring two two runs.

Senior righty Bryan Albee (Killingly), the MVP of the Little East tournament with a win and save, closed out the victory with his staff-leading 22^nd appearance of the year by pitching the final two innings.

One of the nation's top defensive teams, Eastern submitted its 16th error-less game, thanks in part to Oldham's seven strikeouts and nine fly ball outs. Defensively, Malcom threw out Tyler Cannon trying to steal second after the leadoff batter opened the game by walking on a 3-2 pitch, which likely prevented the Profs from taking the early lead after No. 3 hitter Patrick Defeciani stroked a two-out single to center with the bases now empty.

Among the other key defensive plays: With one out in the fifth, Donahue made a one-handed stab of Cannon's ground ball and threw out the batter, and in the seventh, senior second baseman Noah Plantamuro (Bristol) corraled a ground ball on the outfield grass while moving to his left and threw out left-handed-hitting Hunter Wroniuk by a step at first for the first out. The play proved important when three subsequent singles loaded the bases before Oldhman got an inning-ending strikeout of Defeciani on a 3-2 pitch. Prior to the strikeout, it appeared that Oldham had ended the inning on a ground ball to Plantamuro near the second base bag, but the play was nullified when time had been ruled to have occurred. Oldham responded with a fastball that retired Defeciani and ended the inning for good.

Although Eastern and Rowan – which have won a combined six national titles -- have appeared in the NCAA tournament a combined total of 64 times and have competed in a combined 18 national tournaments, the programs were meeting in post-season play for the first time. The programs have participated in the national tournament once in the same year (2004) but did not meet.

A four-time NCAA national champion, Eastern looks to qualify for its first national tournament since it reached the nationals five times in a six-year span between 2002-07. The Warriors are competing in their first Super Regional, which was instituted for the first time in Division III in 2019. Prior to that, teams advanced to the nationals by winning regional tournaments.

Now 31-1 in its last 32 games, Eastern equaled the program season wins record, which was set in 2003 and equaled in 2004.