3/3/2015 12:00:00 AM

Jacksonville Shook in Weekday Contest Against Florida A&M

Box Score

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Jacksonville University baseball team dropped a midweek match up with Florida A&M by a score of 5-1 on Tuesday evening. The Dolphins fall to 5-7, while the Rattlers (4-6) are winners of three-straight. JU will continue its home stand with a weekend series against VCU commencing Friday at 6:30.

The Dolphins struck in the first inning behind singles from Cameron Gibson (1-for-4) and Angelo Amendolare (1-for-4) and a sacrifice fly by Connor Marabell (1-for-3) scoring Gibson, but were blanked for the remainder of the game.

"We had an opportunity tonight to set the tone offensively and to have a big first inning and we didn't execute with timely hitting," said head coach Tim Montez. "Hats off to Florida A&M, its pitchers really went out there and attacked the zone and forced us to put the ball in play and you saw the result of it."

Continuing success at the top of the order, Amendolare has hits in eight-straight games, and is 18-for-34 over that stretch, while Gibson's single marked the sixth-straight game with a hit while improving his streak of reaching base to 27-consecutive. Marabell, drove in his 19th RBI, leads the A-sun, and has hits in eight-straight games with a 23-straight games reaching base streak.

"Positive side of things, we did well on the mound having only walked two after the struggles with our command this past weekend," said Montez. "If you are going to come up on short side of things you want the team on the other side to earn it, and they did."

For the Fins, the rubber belonged to a trio of freshman for the evening, as Spencer Stockton threw three strong innings of one-hit baseball with two strikeouts. Gregory Shannahan also went three innings, no earned runs and struckout three, while Shane Wise (Redshirt-freshman) fanned four batters in his first career start surrendering three earned with three walks and was pegged with the loss.

"For us to only give up one run in the last six-innings and still keep our team in the game with an opportunity to come back, was a positive for us," said Montez. "It's all about confidence; when you execute and score runs it takes pressure off the pitchers. It's going to come down to which guys want to grind it out and just keep pushing forward. If we can do that and mentally stay together we are going to be fine."

For FAMU, Kendal Weeks (1-1) earned the win after working a pre-determined four innings and allowed just one run on four hits with a walk for his first win of the season. Ryan Anderson (1) picked up the save as he pitched the final four scoreless innings.

The latter four hits belonging to the Green were by way of Austin Hays (13), Garrett Ruckel (7), Drew Luther (6) and Parker Perez (8).

Jacksonville plays host to VCU for a weekend series beginning Friday March 6 through Sunday March 9. After a daytrip to Bethune-Cookman on Tuesday, the Fins return home for a weekend series with visiting Samford, March 13-15.

'FIN NOTABLES