WAPPINGERS FALLS, N.Y. (May 26, 2023) – Enter Chuck 2: Electric Boogaloo.
 
Clinging to a one-run lead late in an elimination game on Friday afternoon, the Sacred Heart University baseball team turned once again to sophomore right-hander Charlie Costello (Hopewell Junction, N.Y.), barely 20 hours removed from throwing five scoreless innings to eliminate LIU on Thursday night. This time, Costello logged the final two frames at Heritage Financial Park, once again pitching scoreless ball, as the fourth-seeded Pioneers finished off third-seeded Fairleigh Dickinson on the third day of the Northeast Conference Championship.
 
Sacred Heart (28-29) once again lives to see another day, but will have to win twice on Saturday. The Pioneers will square off with top-seeded Central Connecticut State in an elimination game and semifinal contest at noon. If the Pios can take care of the regular-season champs, they'll earn a date in the title round with second-seeded Wagner, the tournament's lone undefeated team, beginning at 4 p.m. SHU would have to defeat Wagner on Saturday afternoon and again at noon on Sunday to claim the NEC title.
 
FDU sees its season come to a close at 31-21-1. It was the Knights' first 30-win team in program history.
 
All the scoring on Friday came in the first four innings. FDU jumped out to a 2-0 lead against right-hander Mitch Hawkins (Southbury, Conn.) in the bottom of the first inning, Hunter D'Amoto lined a two-run single to right.
 
Sacred Heart answered immediately, with two in the second and three more in the third to stake out to a 5-2 lead it would never relinquish. The FDU pitching staff was handing out free bases like candy on Halloween in the second, as Tyler Galletti (Plainview, N.Y.) walked before Ryan Donnelly (Fairfield, Conn.) provided the inning's only hit with a single to right. From there, both Dante D'Amore (Southington, Conn.) and Joe Emerson (Carlstadt, N.J.) took walks from Patrick Gardner to force home the inning's first run and end the left-hander's day. Right-hander Brendan Medoro took over and surrendered a sacrifice fly to Nick Jaskolski (Seaford, N.Y.) to tie the game, but otherwise limited the damage.
 
Medoro (9-1) would wind up going the rest of the way for FDU, in an impressive relief stint of his own, as he allowed just three runs (two earned) on three hits and two walks, with six strikeouts over eight innings on the mound. However, two of the hits and one of the walks all came in the third inning, which allowed SHU to plate the three runs it needed to get through the afternoon.
 
Justin Jordan (Darien, Conn.) worked a one-out walk and went first-to-third on a single to right field by Galletti. Donnelly followed with his second hit of the day, an RBI single back up the middle to put SHU in front to stay. After a D'Amore sacrifice fly made it 4-2, Emerson reached as Medoro threw the ball away, which allowed Donnelly to score what would stand as an extremely costly unearned run.
 
Meanwhile, right-hander Michael Boyian (Norwalk, Conn.) had taken over to start the bottom of the second on the mound for SHU and allowed just two runs (one earned) on three hits and a walk, with six strikeouts, over six innings of work. His only trouble came in the fourth, when FDU closed the gap to 5-4.
 
D'Amato opened the frame with a single to right and moved to third when Joan Sosa doubled into the right-field corner. A Luke Cantwell sacrifice fly plated D'Amato and then a pair of walks loaded the bases for Justin Sierra, who hit a groundball straight to Sam Mongelli (Marlboro, N.Y.) at short. In extremely un-Mongelli-like fashion, the NEC Player of the Year failed to handle the grounder, which allowed Sosa to score an unearned run and the inning to continue. Boyian (3-1) picked his shortstop up though, as he got Tom Ruscitti to bounce out to second base to end the threat and strand the tying run at third.
 
There would be no more scoring. The Pioneers had no hits and just two baserunners the rest of the way. Meanwhile, Boyian got the side in order in the fifth and sixth, before working around a two-out hit batsman in the seventh.
 
In the eighth inning, it was once again Costello Time for SHU. A trio of singles loaded the bases with nobody out, but the right-hander bore down from there. He struck out pinch hitter Jeremy Cheeseman on five pitches, struck out Zack Will on four, and then got George Rosales to ground out to Mongelli, before being greeted to a hero's welcome from his teammates in the third-base dugout.
 
Costello went back out for the ninth inning and tied a bow on things, as he retired the side in order. A six-pitch strikeout of Brian Sanders, who swung through FDU's final pitch of the season, provided the exclamation mark and sent the Pioneers spilling out of the dugout in celebration and through to Saturday.