CBI Teams Of The Week

Richmond, VA - The Wagner baseball team has been lauded by College Baseball Insider as the website's Northeast Regional Team of the Week, following the Seahawks' series victory over Jacksonville, which garnered preseason top-40 recognition from Collegiate Baseball News.

Following a loss in the opener to the Dolphins on Friday night, the Seahawks picked up a decisive 4-1 win in game two on Saturday, before capping the series with 6-5 game-three victory.

"It was an outstanding weekend for our program," said head coach Jim Carone. "The guys played extremely hard and overcame adversity with a come-from-behind win on Sunday to win the series, which was great to see this early in the season. Our defense was very solid all weekend with a few guys playing different positions than they are accustomed to."

Leading the charge in the Green & White's first victory of the weekend was senior RHP Ryan Van Spronsen (Brantford, Ontario / Assumption College), who was outstanding in collecting his second-straight win against a 2011 NCAA Regional participant. The Canadian native recorded his first career nine-inning complete game, yielding just one run on five hits with a personal-best nine strikeouts.

For his efforts, Van Spronsen earned Northeast Conference (NEC) Pitcher of the Week honors and was lauded by College Baseball Today national writer Eric Sorenson. On the year, he is 2-0 with 13 strikeouts, a 2.05 ERA and 0.90 WHIP over 22.0 innings of work while limiting the opposition to a .194 average. For Sorenson's take on Van Spronsen's effort click HERE

"Ryan has been phenomenal in all three of his starts so far and we expect that to continue as we head into NEC play," added Carone."

Wagner then rallied for a 6-5 victory in the series finale against JU while a series win before Northeast Conference (NEC) play for the first time since the 2009 season. Sophomore RHP Ryan Casey (Paramus, NJ / St. Joseph Regional) helped put the Seahawks in position for the win with 5.0 solid innings and freshman Anthony Battaglia (Staten Island, NY / St. Joseph By The Sea) closed out the game with tying run just 90 feet from home for his first career save.

"Ryan pitched a solid game on Sunday and threw a ton of strikes, before Anthony showed fearlessness in a tough sport at the end of the game," said Carone."

Wagner returns to action today with a single game at No. 20 Georgia Tech. First pitch is slated for 4:00 pm as live stats can be accessed by clicking HERE and a video stream (subscriber) by clicking HERE