UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa - Dante Biasi dominated on the mound with a career-high 13 strikeouts, while his catcher Ryan Sloniger blasted a solo home run in the seventh inning to give Penn State the lead for good in the Nittany Lions 3-1 win against UMass Lowell on Friday afternoon.
In front of a stellar crowd for the Nittany Lions home opener and picture-perfect weather, Biasi set the tone for Penn State with a whopping ten strikeouts in the first four innings.
"We were just mixing pitches, throwing whatever Coach Newman and (Sloniger) thought was best," Biasi said. "We were working in and out with the fastball. I really felt I had a better feel for the fastball than the last couple games. It kind of just got us off to a jump start."
Despite working around one early run in the second inning, Biasi cruised through seven innings on the mound never letting the River Hawks threaten aside from the second.
"It's been a lot of fun to watch," head coach Rob Cooper said. "What I think you're seeing is a young man really maturing as a pitcher. He's strong and healthy. Today what you saw is a pitcher who flat out dictated the terms of the game. It was a lot of fun to watch. I think it was a guy who really likes to compete and really likes to work on his craft."
Sloniger had a front row seat to Biasi's dominant performance and has been feeling this dominance coming for some time.
"Dante is talking about his fastball command. I've been telling him that last few weeks, once you get that locked in nobody is going to hit you. I feel like he has as good of stuff as anybody and today he had that fastball command.
While Biasi dealt on the mound, the Nittany Lions bats were initially silenced by Lowell's starting pitcher Connor Metelski who no-hit Penn State through five innings.
The Nittany Lion bats have struggled to get going early in the 2019 season even though the wins have begun to pile up. Last season's leading bat was Sloniger, but he was only hitting a meager .159 entering today's action.
In his second at-bat of the day, Sloniger worked a deep count and was able to pick up just his second at-bat of the season.
"The at-bat before, about four straight pitches I was a little late," Sloniger said. "So I just wanted to get the head out, get the foot down and get the head out and stay on top of the ball. I got a good pitch to hit, that first pitch and I was ready to hit it."
Three innings later, Sloniger's approach worked as he turned on the first pitch of the inning from Metelski and launched it over the wall in right field.
"It felt really good," Sloniger said. "I felt really close here the last few series. I felt like the UCF series I really started to turn things around and really all year I don't feel like I've been far away. It felt good to get going there."
As a team, Penn State was hitting just .240 entering Friday. Cooper knows the offense has room for improvement, but he is pleased with the general attitude surrounding the team and especially Sloniger.
"All you got to do is spend a little time around Ryan Sloniger and know that he cares and wants to win," Cooper said. "He plays a position where you really have to be mentally tough to separate your offense from your defense. He's been grinding away and offensively had a great year last year for us, so the start that he's off to isn't what he wanted, but that shows you he isn't just going to throw away at bats. All you need is a couple of really good quality at-bats, and you could see him really get going. Obviously, it was a big hit for us, but I was happy for him too."
Penn State would go on to add an insurance run in the eighth inning with two outs on a single from RBI leader Kris Kremer.
Mason Mellott closed out the series-opening win for the Nittany Lions with a two-inning save improving Penn State's record to 11-3 on the young season.
"We believe we can win," Sloniger said. "We believe we can beat any team any time we go out on the field. If we are struggling a little that day or are down, it's never over for us. We believe we are going to come out on top at the end of the day."
