Box Score Don Schaly Stadium in Marietta has become the second home for the John Carroll University baseball team. After all after today's game, John Carroll has played just as many games in Marietta as it has at Schweickert Field.

Making its first NCAA Tournament appearance in 30 years, John Carroll was in search of another strong start in Marietta. No. 7/9 Salibury, the third-seeded team in the Mideast Regional, jumped out to a 6-0 lead to take the 9-8 decision on Tuesday afternoon. Salisbury improved to 34-7 while John Carroll fell to 24-16.

The Seagulls threw closer Kyle Hamby in the ninth in a non-save situation. The righty only had given up six runs all season in 23 innings of work. John Carroll trailed by five.

The Blue and Gold rallied furiously with Robby Cifelli drawing a leadoff walk to start the inning. JCU strung together back-to-back hits to load up the bases with no outs with singles off of the bats of Bobby Sabatino and Chet Lauer.

Continuing the rally Jimmy Spagna roped his fourth hit of the game to bring in his third run of the afternoon. With the bases still loaded Tyler Gentile shot a grounder under the Salisbury first baseman's glove to bring in two runs making the score 9-7.

Hamby exited the game allowing four runs without recording an out after a single by David Crowley plated Spagna making it a 1-run game.

John Carroll pushed the tying run to third with Mark Huddle's sacrifice bunt. With the bases loaded and one out the Blue Streaks attempted the squeeze bunt by the Seagulls first baseman Quinn Griffith was ready for the play.

Down to its last out, Dan Fein worked out of the bases-loaded jam getting Cifelli to fly out on a 3-2 pitch to end the game.

"They showed a lot of heart," said head coach Marc Thibeault. "Our guys came through stringing together some hits off of a really good closer. He struggled which gave us some energy. We did a good job with two strikes trying to stay on top of the ball and hit hard ground balls in that situation. We made Salisbury work hard. David Crowley had his third hit of the day, another great at bat cutting the inside of the ball and going the other way with it. We created one out too many."

John Carroll threatened in the top of the first inning but was unable to push a run across the plate. Lauer broke through with a 2-out single down the right field line. JCU would extend the inning when Spagna reached via an error. After the duo moved up 90 feet on a wild pitch they were unable to score.

Salisbury jumped on Aaron Lapaglia in the second inning. The Seagulls struck for six runs chasing the ace from the game after just two innings. The Blue Streaks battled their way out of the inning with Lauer mowing down Quinn Griffith trying to move to second on a throw to the plate.

"When you get into postseason baseball sometimes runs come in bunches as it's a momentum swing," said Thibeault. "You also saw that with our final frame (today). We were chasing some small mistakes in terms of first pitch balls getting them (Salisbury) in a little bit of a hitter's count. It's very difficult to do against a team like that, who can swing. If we could throw strike one we felt like we had a chance."

John Carroll chipped away starting in the third inning. The Blue and Gold broke through for two runs. Spagna drove in the first run with a hit through the left side. Crowely punched a hit through to left with Lauer sliding in just ahead of the throw to make it a 6-2 game.

The Seagulls would tack on three runs in the fourth inning.

Poised to have a big inning John Carroll started the sixth with back-to-back hits from Huddle and David Lykens. Salisbury starter Brett Collacchi uncorked a wild pitch allowing Huddle to come in the score. The righty recovered to work out of the jam only allowing one run.

Looking to spark new life into the Blue Streaks Spagna banged his third hit of the day with a solo homer to left in the seventh inning to make it a 9-4 game. The homer was Spagna's fifth of the season, tied for the team lead.

The Blue Streaks did outhit the Seagulls 14-13. Leading the way offensively was Spagna with four hits and three RBIs. Also finishing with multiple hits were Crowley (3), Lauer (3) and Sabatino (2).

"Jimmy saw it well and was aggressive on fastballs," said Thibeault. "He used both sides of the field which was really good. Your seniors have to play well in big games and he was one of the guys who played well for us."

Lapaglia took the loss to fall to 8-4. He pitched two innings allowing six runs.

Holding the pitching together was junior Tyler Ferretti. The righty fired 4 1/3 innings of 1-hit baseball to keep the bullpen relatively intact for Wednesday.

Said Thibeault, "The star of the game on our side was Tyler Ferretti, pitching 4 1/3 and only giving up one hit. He has nice clean innings to gain the momentum back to us. We made good plays behind him."

John Carroll falls to the elimination bracket and will take on the loser of the Case Western Reserve-Thomas More game at 1 p.m. on Thursday, May 15. Stay tuned to the baseball team's Twitter account @JCU_Baseball for any potential weather updates.

Said Thibeault, "Basically, a situation like this cannot take the wind out of their sails. We've got to still keep our swagger and momentum. We've talked about it all year to control your own destiny. The only thing we're unable to control is what regional we're going to and what seed we were going to be because that was in the hands of somebody else. We forced those guys who make those decisions to make one. There was no wait and see at 2 a.m. if we were going to get in.

"All year long no matter if it was qualifying for our conference tournament or winning our conference tournament or getting to this point here, we've been trying to control it. We need to be who we are. What you saw today was who we are, maybe not in the first six innings, but with a lot of heart, character and maturity. It's real easy to pack it in when you're down 7-2. They had no quit in them and that has to be on display tomorrow at 1 p.m."