PHILADELPHIA – The Saint Joseph's baseball team notched another series sweep on Sunday as the Hawks routed La Salle, 12-2, in seven innings for their program-record 19th Atlantic 10 victory of the season.
 
HOW IT HAPPENED
• Saint Joseph's (29-14 overall, 19-2 Atlantic 10) took a first-inning lead as Joey Gale walked and Blake Primrose singled to bring up Richard Beggy; his double scored Gale to give the Hawks the early lead.  Joey Pagano then doubled it with an RBI groundout.
 
• The Explorers got a sacrifice fly from Carter Groen in the bottom of the inning to cut the lead in half.
 
• The Hawks broke things open in the top of the second.  Tim Dickinson led off the inning with a triple before Alex Venezia drew a walk.  Two batters later, Gale ripped a double to score a run and chase La Salle starter Kross Howarth.
 
• A pair of wild pitches would plate Venezia and Gale while walks to Primrose, Beggy and Pagano loaded the bases.  Jason Janesko then reached on a catcher's interference before Dickinson singled home a pair to extend the lead to 8-1.
 
• Dickinson then reached on a two-out error in the fourth that allowed Pagano and Janesko to score and push the edge to 10-1.  Janesko then added a two-out, two-run double in the fifth to make it a 12-1 game.
 
• La Salle (18-26 overall, 4-17 Atlantic 10) mounted some offense in the bottom of the sixth through an RBI single by Dom Tilden, but Matt Fitzgibbon came on to escape a no-out, bases-loaded jam and keep the margin at 10.  He then struck out three of four batters he faced in the seventh to end the ballgame via run rule.
 
BEHIND THE BOX SCORE
• Luke Parise allowed two runs on seven hits while striking out four in five innings to improve to 6-1 on the season.  Howarth fell to 1-3 after being charged with five runs on four hits and two walks in an inning and a third.
 
• Primrose, Janesko, and Dickinson had two hits apiece for the Hawks, while Primrose and Pagano scored three runs each.  Janesko added three runs batted in while Dickinson collected a pair.  Both Pagano and Venezia worked three walks apiece.
 
• The Hawks scored in the first inning for the 16th time in 21 conference games.
 
• Conference win number 19 is a new single-season high for Saint Joseph's; the previous mark was the 18 league wins the Hawks recorded in 2014, when they also set a program record for overall victories with 35.
 
UP NEXT
The Hawks are slated to visit Villanova on Tuesday for their final non-conference game of the season.