Baseball Beats Pitt 7-3 for Second Win vs. ACC Foe this Season

Tuesday, February 25

Pittsburgh, Pa.

3 p.m.

Bucknell University

4-3

Pittsburgh

5-2

BUCKNELL

PITTSBURGH

Photo by: Alisa Mitchell

Baseball Beats Pitt 7-3 for Second Win vs. ACC Foe this Season

2/25/2025 8:01:00 PM | Baseball

Box Score

PITTSBURGH, Pa. – Seven Bucknell pitchers combined on a four-hitter with 17 strikeouts, and the Bison baseball squad downed Pittsburgh 7-3 on Tuesday at Charles L. Cost Field. Bucknell won its third straight game to improve to 4-3 on the season, and it picked up its second win of the season against a team from the Atlantic Coast Conference. It was Bucknell's first win since 1991 against the Panthers, who came in with a 5-1 record.

Luke Nascimento hit his first career home run to get the Bison off to a good start, and Ryan Facinelli had two hits including a key RBI double to provide some insurance in the eighth inning. Bucknell collected seven hits and drew nine walks, but the story of the day was the team's work on the mound.

Freshman Everett Garber got the start and picked up the first five outs. Sophomore Dante Pavone, who earned his first collegiate win, came out of the bullpen and got a big strikeout to strand the bases loaded in a 1-1 game in the second. Pavone went on to pitch two more scoreless innings with five strikeouts.

After the Bison took a 4-1 lead with two unearned runs in the fourth, AJ Murray was touched for a home run in the fifth, but that would be the last hit allowed by a Bucknell pitcher all day. Frankie Bilecki, Bryce Mitchell, Nick Mulvey, and Jonathan Adelmann combined for 5.2 no-hit innings with eight strikeouts and only two walks.

Adelmann was especially dominant, recording the final five outs with four punchouts. Things got a bit nervy in the ninth when two routine ground balls were thrown away for errors, but Adelmann struck out Jackson Cooke looking and Luke Cantwell swinging on a nasty slider to end it. The sophomore righthander has now fanned nine in 6.2 scoreless innings over three appearances this season.

The 17 strikeouts were four shy of the team record of 21, set in 1956 against Franklin & Marshall (all by Don Richards) and in 1989 against Wilkes.

Nascimento went to the opposite field for his first collegiate home run with one out in the second inning against Pitt starter Aidan Coleman. The Panthers tied it on a bases-loaded walk in the bottom of the frame, but Michael Trommer's RBI double with one out in the third gave Bucknell the lead for good.

In the fourth, Nascimento walked with one out, Matt Alexander singled, and two batters later they both scored on a throwing error. Pavone got back-to-back strikeouts to escape a bases-loaded, one-out jam in the fourth, and then after Pitt pulled within 4-3 in the fifth, Bucknell notched single runs in the sixth, seventh, and eighth.

The first two insurance runs came on bases-loaded balks, and then in the eighth a pair of doubles from Billy Kender and Facinelli upped the lead to 7-3. Mulvey and Adelmann took it from there, combining for five strikeouts in the last two frames.

The Bison will bring a three-game winning streak into Saturday's home opener. Bucknell hosts Saint Joseph's in a doubleheader starting at noon at Depew Field, and then the Bison and Hawks will play a single game in Philadelphia on Sunday.