Prince George's Baseball Wins NJCAA Region XX Baseball Championship For Second-Straight Season

Prince George's Baseball Wins NJCAA Region XX Baseball Championship For Second-Straight Season

GREENBURG, Pa. – Freshman Dominic Marquez (Long Beach, Calif./Jordan) stifles Montgomery College for nine-inning on the mound in a complete-game performance to lift Prince George's Community College past Montgomery 8-2 in the National Junior College Athletic Conference (NJCAA) Region XX Division III Baseball Championship Game on Sunday.

Marquez gave the Owls a dominate performance on the hill in the championship game, including posting a no-hitter through the first four innings. The freshman allowed two runs on six hits with two walks and four strikeouts. Despite two walks to open the fourth and a Prince George's error in the third, Marquez did not allow a base hit through four innings. He allowed a run in the fifth and the seventh, but then retired nine of the last 11 batters faced and when sophomore Austin Adams (Atlanta, Ga./Whitewater) corralled the final out in the ninth in right field the Owls had won their second-straight region title.

Marquez, who tossed two scoreless innings in the 10-0 win against the Raptors on Friday, was named to the All-Tournament team after allowing two runs on six hits in 11.0 innings over a three-day period.

Adams was also named to the All-Tournament team and went 3-for-6 on the afternoon with two runs scored and two RBIs. The sophomore went 7-for-16 with four runs scored, four RBIs and two doubles in the three games in Western Pennsylvania and 9-for-20 with five runs scored and six RBIs in the whole tournament including the CCAC South play-in victory.

Fellow sophomore Brandon Crosby (Richmond, Va./Atlee, Mechanicsville) added a 2-for-4 performance with three RBIs, a two-run homer and two runs scored while sophomore Bay To (Philadelphia, Pa./Neumann-Goretti) added three hits including his team-leading eighth home run of the season. To, who had the final out hit to him in last year's region crown, along with Adams, Crosby and Naquan Holden (Brooklyn, N.Y./Perkiomen) are the only members of both region titles in the last two years.

The Largo team will now head to Wentworth, N.C., to face Rockingham County Community College in a best-of-three series on Friday and Saturday in the NJCAA District D Championship.  Rockingham County defeated top seed Surry Community College 11-10 on Sunday to win the NJCAA Region X Division III title. Surry was the team Prince George's defeated last season in the NJCAA District D Championship to advance to the NJCAA Division III World Series. Two wins against Rockingham County will send the Owls back to the World Series for the second-straight season.

For the third-straight day, Prince George's jumped out to the advantage and went on for the victory.

The Owls took the lead In the first after Adams doubled, stole third and came home on Crosby's RBI groundout for a 1-0 edge.

A three-run fourth increased the advantage to 4-0. To led off the frame with a solo homer. Tommy Petrosino Jr (Bayonne, N.J./St. Anthony's)  was then hit with a pitch, Shawn Alicea (Brooklyn, N.Y./Grand Street) singled and Pedro Montero (LaRomana, Dominican Republic/Colegio Nueva) walked before Adams plated Petrosino and Alicea on a two-run single for a four-run lead.

Prince George's increased the margin to five runs with a run in the fifth thanks to Crosby double, To single and Josh Pietrandrea (Woodbridge, Va./Woodbridge) sacrifice fly to center to allow Crosby to cross the plate.

After the Raptors got the scoreboard with a run in the fifth, Adams doubled and rounded the bases on Crosby's two-run homer for a 7-1 margin. Pietrandrea reached on an error and came around to score on Vinny Rotundo's (New York, N.Y./Middletown) RBI double for an 8-1 advantage. Montgomery posted a run in the bottom of the seventh, but then Marquez took over to retire nine of the final 11 batters he faced in the game.

Along with Adams and Marquez, Petrosino and Pietrandrea were selected to the All-Tournament team. Pietrandrea went 6-for-14 with five runs scored, five RBIs and a homer in the three days in Pennsylvania and 8-for-17 with seven runs scored, eight RBIs and two homers in all four tournament games. Petrosino, who knocked in the go-ahead run in a 10-8 win against Westmoreland County Community College on Saturday, went 5-for-13 with five runs scored and two RBIs in the three days in Pennsylvania and 7-for-17 with seven runs scored and two RBIs in the four-game tournament.

Prince George's won its fifth region title in program history after capturing the title in 1978 and 1979 under Donald "Cap" Redmiles, who is being inducted into the Prince George's Community College Inaugural Intercollegiate Athletics Hall of Fame on May 15. Under the guidance of Foster, the squad has won the region crown three times in the last five years after with other titles coming in 2014 and 2017.