Box Score | Season Stats

HARRISONBURG, Va. – Unofficially the longest game in program history at five hours and 46 minutes, the Northeastern baseball team lost a marathon, 19-inning affair to James Madison, 7-6, on Friday at Veterans Memorial Park during both school's 2016 CAA opener.
 
Twenty different NU players helped the Huskies go the distance with the Dukes, including 15 position players and five pitchers. After both teams had posted matching two-run frames in the eighth inning, neither side was able to plate a run until more than 10 innings later, when Kyle McPherson hit the game-winning double to right center.
 
Aaron Civale struck out 10 batters during 7.0 innings on the mound for Northeastern (9-10, 0-1 CAA), reaching double figures in strikeouts for the third consecutive start. Back-to-back sixth-inning home runs by James Madison's Ky Parrott and Brett Johnson did Civale in for three of his four earned runs, but Max Burt's two-run bomb in the eighth left the right-hander in line for the win upon his departure.
 
Mike Fitzgerald picked up the reigns in the ninth after Andrew Misiaszek had gone an inning and a third, striking out two but having surrendered the tying run in the eighth. Fitzgerald's four strikeouts helped preserve the game's 6-6 tie until the end of the 13th, before Tyler Robinson struck out five on his way to the 17th. Together with Nate Borges, the Huskies threw 23 strikeouts, 10 more than the Dukes' 13.
 
Josh Treff had the answer for McPherson's first-inning home run during the top of the second, sending a solo shot over the wall in left center. Three batters later, Keith Kelly put NU in front for the first time, knocking an RBI double down the left-field line during one of his game-leading 10 at-bats.
 
Ryan Solomon went first-to-third on two ground balls in the top of the sixth, scoring easily on a two-out RBI single by Treff that put the Huskies ahead, 3-1. Mason Koppens placed a bunt down for a single during the next at-bat, leaving the door open for Burt to single through the left side, boosting Northeastern's lead to 4-1.
 
Two innings after James Madison (10-12, 1-0 CAA) had tied the game at 4-4 in the sixth, Treff laced his third hit of the day down the left-field line for a double to leadoff the eighth. Burt proceeded to help NU regain the lead at 6-4, powering a two-run homer to left, the third of his career.
 
Dealing with two JMU runners on base in the eighth, Misiaszek struck out McPherson for the second out of the inning, but conceded a run on an RBI single by the Dukes' Kyle Weston. Tyler Carroll scored the tying run for JMU during the next at-bat, darting home on a wild pitch.
 
Fitzgerald ran into trouble in the bottom of the 13th, giving up a single to Bradley McKay and overthrowing Nick Fanneron at first base on an intended sacrifice bunt. With no outs and the winning run on third, Fitzgerald struck out Weston, intentionally loaded the bases by walking Zach Tondi, struck out Adam Sisk, and forced Michael Sciorra to fly out to end the frame.
 
The NU defense came up big again in the bottom of the 16th, trapping the Dukes on the base paths and preventing the winning run from scoring on an inning-ending, 5-2-6-4 double play.
 
Northeastern had a chance to score the go-ahead run in the top of the 19th, but David Hopkins was thrown out at the plate after Kelly had ripped a liner off the glove of the James Madison first baseman. Borges began the home half of the 19th with back-to-back walks, striking out McKay before McPherson hit the game-winning double.
 
The Huskies and the Dukes will be back on the diamond for the second game of the series on Saturday, March 26, at 2 p.m.