Appel's No-Hitter Lifts Baseball Over Mount St. Mary's 2-0
The series concludes on Sunday with a game at 12:00 p.m.
Sophomore Mike Appel tossed a no-hitter to lift Central Connecticut over Mount St. Mary's, 2-0, on Saturday in Northeast Conference baseball action. Appel faced just three batters over the minimum to help CCSU improve to 8-7 on the year and 2-0 in conference play.
It is the first no-hitter for CCSU in head coach Charlie Hickey's 18 seasons. The loss drops Mount St. Mary's to 0-13 overall and 0-2 in NEC play.
The teams will wrap up the series on Sunday with a single game at 12:00 p.m.
Appel got all the support he would need when the Blue Devils pushed across two runs in the fourth. Junior Dylan Maher plated classmate Dean Lockery on a sacrifice fly to make it 1-0. Freshman Chris Kanios followed with a two-out single through the left side to bring in junior Ryan Costello to push the lead to 2-0. Central would load the bases with two outs, but The Mount avoided further damage thanks to a nice defensive play by Alex Kriss to save a couple runs and end the inning.
Appel, who was perfect through 4.1 innings, would make the lead stand up. The Mountaineers got their first runner with one out in the fifth inning after Dennis Stewart was hit by a pitch. He would move to third base with two outs, but Appel would get a strikeout to end the inning and leave the runner stranded.
Mount's Joshua Lenig reached on an error in the sixth inning and would get to third base with two outs, but again Appel would end the threat. He would induce a ground ball to second base for the third out and did not allow another runner past first base from their.
In the ninth inning, Mount would lead off with a walk, but Appel would get a double-play to erase the runner. He recorded the final out with a fly ball to left field to seal the first CCSU no-hitter in Hickey's tenure.
Appel's final line was 9.0 innings, no hits, three strikeouts and one walk and two hit batsmen. In two career starts against Mount St. Mary's, Appel has gone 2-0 and allowed no runs on just two hits across 16.0 innings. He has struck out six and walked two in that span.
Lockery and freshman Buddy Dewaine each had two hits for the Blue Devils, while Kanios collected Central's only other hit.
Jordan Lawson took the loss for Mount St. Mary's. He allowed two runs in 6.2 innings on four hits and four walks, with one strikeout.
The teams are scheduled to conclude the series on Sunday with a single game at 12:00 p.m.