Grand Slam Powers Brewers Past Engineers, 13-6

POUGHKEEPSIE – Junior Adam Talwalkar hit a grand slam at the bottom of the eighth inning to help the Vassar baseball team secure a 13-6 victory over RPI in Liberty League play on Sunday afternoon. The Brewers (12-18, 4-10 Liberty) heated up with 13 hits while holding the Engineers (12-14, 4-8 Liberty) to seven.

Junior Bryce Grathwohl struck out two Engineers’ batters in the first inning, and the Brewers loaded the bases in the bottom of the frame. RPI’s Alex Vallee pitched well and tallied two strikeouts to keep it scoreless. Grathwohl struck out one batter in a 1-2-3 second inning, and then a double play from Reid Lapekas, Ricardo Reyna, and Ty Murray quickly ended the third inning.

RPI broke the deadlock at the top of the fourth. Grathwohl struck out the lead-off batter before Joey Saia reached second on an error. Grathwohl caught Sai stealing to make it two outs. A Vassar error and then a Hudson Livesey double to left third put runners on second and third. John Moncur followed up with a double to bring in two scores. Moncur scored on a shortstop error to make it 0-3.

Vassar did not respond until the bottom of the fifth when they tied the game 3-3. Murray doubled in Lapekas for the first run. Alex Warren hit a sacrifice fly to right field that brought junior Andrew Kanellis home, and then another sacrifice fly from Reyna allowed Murray to score.

Junior Frankie Murphy subbed in to pitch at the top of the sixth and struck out one batter before the Engineers loaded the bases. He struck out the final batter to keep it a tie game.
Vassar added four runs at the bottom of the frame. With the bases loaded, Ezra Caspi was hit by a pitch to bring Finn Kaplan-Moore home, and then a wild pitch brought Kanellis in to make it 5-3. Warren tripled to bring in two more runs, and he scored on a shortstop error to push the Vassar lead to 8-3.

Talkwalkar hit a home run to left field at the bottom of the seventh and knocked in a grand slam his next at-bat in the eighth to make it 13-3. RPI mustered a small comeback in the ninth but ultimately fell when the Brewers used their third double play of the game to close out.

Frankie Murphy (1-1) picked up the win on the hill, giving up just two hits over 3.0 innings of relief. He struck out four and walked three. Grathwohl went 5.0 innings with three hits, three runs, and five strikeouts. RPI’s Vallee allowed three runs on six hits in 4.0 innings, picking up four strikeouts and one walk.

Vassar plays Mount Saint Vincent in non-conference play on Wed. Apr. 27 at 4 p.m. at Prentiss Field.