Stockton Bats Come Alive Late as Ospreys Split Doubleheader

For 13 innings on Thursday, March 28, the Richard Stockton College of New Jersey softball team didn’t produce much offensively.

First, the Ospreys lost their first game of the season.

Then, they found themselves down by three runs heading into the final inning of a double header against St. Joseph’s College of Long Island.

In an instant, the Ospreys’ offensive woes were a distant memory.

Freshman Nichole Tomo led off the inning with a solo home run, her second of the season, igniting an offense four more hits in the inning, including a pair of doubles, and a game-winning RBI single by freshman Dominique Dorris, lifting Stockton to a 5-4 win.

“Hitting’s contagious, and once one person got on, everyone started to hit,” Dorris said.

Dorris was responsible for Stockton’s first score of the game, an RBI single that plated Jessica Goncalves in the sixth inning. That run made the game a 4-1 affair.

“You need to start somewhere,” Dorris said. “We started there and just chipped away.”

The Golden Eagles’ big inning was the fifth, thanks to a pair of two-run home runs by Julianne Tierney and Mallory McClafferty.

Stockton attempted to respond in the sixth. After Dorris’ RBI single, she advanced to second when Grace Long, an Egg Harbor Township graduate, was walked. With runners on first and second and two outs, Golden Eagles pitcher Cassie Martinez was able to retire the final batter to end the threat.

There would be no escape for St. Joseph’s in the final inning.

It started with Tomo’s solo home run, followed by a double from Stephanie Hand, who was credited as the winning pitcher. Hand went home on a double by freshman Gianna Cuffari.

Rachel Forte’s single plated Cuffari for the tying run. Nicole Scanlon walked to put runners on first and second before Dorris’ heroics.

“I went up there confident I could get the job done and get the run in,” Dorris said. “ … This proved what kind of team we are this year. We believe in each other.”

Michelle Pietrocola pitched 6 1/3 innings, striking out nine, walking eight and giving up four runs. Hand pitched the final 2/3 of the seventh inning, fanning one batter and forcing another into a groundout.

“Hand has not pitched since the fifth game (of the season),” Stockton coach Val Julien said of the Oakcrest High School alum. “And even there, she pitched two or three innings. For her to come in and save the game the way she did was stunning.”

The Ospreys played their first 10 games of the season in Florida, and won all 10. They returned to New Jersey and swept a double header against Hunter College to improve to 12-0. 

The Ospreys won three of the 10 games in Florida by one run, and won every other game by at least five. They defeated Hunter College by a combined score of 25-0, ending each game after five innings.

St. Joseph’s ended the Ospreys’ undefeated season in the first game of Thursday’s double header. Long hit a solo homer in the fifth inning to give Stockton a 1-0 lead, but Tierney’s two-run homer in the seventh gave St. Joseph’s the win.

Brittany Ksiezopolski struck out 10 batters and allowed four hits for Stockton, but suffered the loss.

St. Joseph’s also handed Stockton a key loss last season, dropping the host Ospreys into the losers’ bracket of the ECAC tournament.

“They threw their ace (Julia DeCarmine) in the first game after resting her yesterday,” Julien said. “They really stepped up. They’re going to do well in their conference.”

Stockton is now 13-1, and returns to action Saturday, March 30, for a double header with Montclair State, currently ranked No. 1 in the country.

St. Joseph’s is now 9-7 for the season.