The Judges baseball team split its two contests this past week. On Monday, the team lost a tight game at Springfield College, but on Tuesday they made up for it with a historic win against usual foe, Amherst College. They couldn’t take that momentum into their series with Emory, losing all four games. Here is the breakdown for the week.

Judges 0, Pride 1

Despite a gem on the mound from pitcher Mason Newman ’21 the Judges dropped a tight pitching duel with a score of 1–0 to Springfield College on Monday. On the heels of splitting a double header with Salem State, the Judges came into the contest with The Pride sitting at a respectable 8–4 on the young season. If you like a good pitching matchup, this would have been the game for you. Newman, in his third start of the season, hurled a complete game three hitter, giving up one unearned run, striking out four and walking just one batter. On most days, that would have been a performance strong enough to earn the win, but unfortunately for the Judges, they contended with an even better outing from Springfield’s starter Dakota Aldrich. Aldrich threw eight one-hit innings, striking out eight Brandeis batters and walking four. Springfield’s single run came with two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning. The Pride’s second baseman, Mark Joao, reached on an error by Brandeis third baseman Isaac Fossas ’21 before scoring on an RBI double by designated hitter, Jake Gleason. The Judges’ lone hit came from the bat of outfielder Donnie Weiss III ’20 in the third inning, because they couldn’t get a rally going against Springfield’s stellar pitching and were eventually shutout in a tight duel by a score of 1–0. 

Judges 6, Mammoths 4

After a frustrating loss on Monday in Springfield, the Judges earned a monumental result at Amherst College on Tuesday. Taking a page out of the Tampa Bay Rays’ playbook, Brandeis elected to have a “staff day” in which numerous members of the pitching staff toe the rubber for an inning or two, instead of a starter expected to pitch deeper into the game. The Mammoths came out of the gate strong against Christian Petrisko ’22 and Rik Jhamb ’22, scoring two runs in the bottom of the first and third innings. Amherst starter Wilson Taylor began the game even stronger, throwing a perfect game through five innings, stifling Brandeis’s strong lineup in the process. Dan O’Leary ’20 got the Judges’ bats going, leading off the top of the sixth with a double to center field, ending Taylor’s perfect game and no-hit bid. The Judges continued to chip away at the impressive righty, moving the chain and eventually loading the bases. They scored three runs in the inning on a passed ball by the Amherst catcher, a groundout and a single by Mike Khoury ’21. After the third inning, shutdown pitching out of the Brandeis bullpen from Tim Lopez ’20, Kyle Shedden ’20, Daniel Schupper ’19, Gavin Dauer ’22 (W 1-1), and Marc Maestri ’22 (SV - 1) combined to shut out the Mammoths. The Judges scored twice to take the lead in the top of the eighth after Luke Hall ’21 double scored classmate Isaac Fossas ’21. The Judges tacked on an insurance run in the top of the ninth inning, and Dauer and Maestri struck out the Mammoths’ final six batters to secure emphatically Brandeis’s first win over Amherst since 2009, pushing the team to a 9-5 record for the season.    Lopez, who played a large role in the game, sees the win as a springboard for the team going forward, saying, “It was a huge team win. The best win I’ve ever been a part of here at Brandeis. When you have a staff day and it’s just a great game like that, you really feel like your team is going in the right direction.” 

Judges 1, Eagles 11; Judges 8, Eagles 13; Judges 6, Eagles 16; Judges 7, Eagles 17

After entering the University Athletic Association schedule in good spirits after a gigantic comeback win against Amherst College on Tuesday, the Judges were not able to maintain their comeback this weekend in Atlanta, getting swept in a four-game series against the Emory Eagles. The Judges lost 11–1  in the first game of the series on Friday. Victor Oppenheimer ’20 had the only RBI for Brandeis, plating Weiss III with a single in the seventh. On Saturday, the Judges’ offense caught fire, scoring 14 runs between the two games. The bats were led by Mike Khoury ’21, who reached base in seven out of his ten plate appearances with a double, two RBIs and three runs scored. Strong hitting wasn’t enough in the end, however; the Judges lost both games of the double header, 13–8 and 16–6, respectively. In the final game of the four-game series on Sunday, the Judges’ pitching continued to falter against what proved to be a devastating Emory lineup. Third baseman Isaac Fossas ’21 went deep for the second time in the series and drove in three runs for the Judges, and Khoury contributed with two RBIs, but in keeping with the pattern throughout the rest of the series, the Judges’ pitching couldn’t contain the Eagle’s batters, an imbalance that manifested itself in a 17–7 loss explained by Brandeis Athletics.