April 6, 2004

Box Score

The Duquesne University baseball team won its home opener versus the University of Pittsburgh, 9-5 at Duquesne Field in Green Tree Borough. The Dukes improved to 9-9 on the season while the Panthers, who are ranked second in the CollegeBaseballInsider.com Northeast Coaches Poll, fell to 17-6.

Duquesne jumped to a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first as senior Dan Schwartzbauer (Glenshaw, PA/Shaler) and sophomore Steve Maiolo (Pittsburgh, PA/Mt. Lebanon) led off the inning with singles and redshirt freshman Joe Berletic (Jefferson Hills, PA/Thomas Jefferson) knocked them both in four batters later.

After starting pitcher junior Bob Reifschneider (Lower Burrell, PA/Burrell) gave up one run in a predetermined two innings of work, the Dukes scored five times in the bottom of the fifth, powered by senior Luke Taggart's (Somerset, PA/Somerset) grand slam - his first collegiate home run - to give DU a 7-1 advantage.

Pitt scored twice in the top of the fifth to cut the lead to 7-3, but Taggart went deep again in the sixth and Maiolo drove in Schwartzbauer with a sacrifice fly to push the lead back to six runs. Pitt scored two more times in the top of the seventh to complete the game's scoring.

Junior Mike Korzeniewski (Fredonia, NY/Fredonia) pitched 4 1/3 innings of relief work to pick up his first collegiate win while junior Dave Knechtel (Mercer, PA/Mercer) and sophomore Adam Haun (Polk, PA/Franklin) pitched the final 2 2/3 innings of hitless baseball.

The Red and Blue return to the Diamond tomorrow, Wednesday, April 7 as they travel to Kent State for a 3:00 pm contest.