CAMDEN, N.J. (April 26, 2024) – Rutgers University-Camden will host the New Jersey Athletic Conference Baseball Championships May 3-5 and the Scarlet Raptors seemed determined to do so as one of the top seeds in the six-team tournament.
 
For the second consecutive day, Rutgers-Camden defeated 20th-ranked Montclair State University in a key NJAC game, this time on the Raptors' own field with an 8-5 victory. The victory moved Rutgers-Camden up to a third-place tie with Ramapo College with a 10-6 conference record. The two teams are one game behind co-leading Kean University and Stockton University, who both own 11-5 NJAC marks.
 
Ramapo hosts Stockton Saturday in a NJAC doubleheader, while Kean hosts Rutgers-Newark on the last day of the regular season. Rutgers-Camden plays an 11:30 a.m. NJAC doubleheader at William Paterson University.
 
After posting a 3-2 win at Montclair State on Thursday, Rutgers-Camden rolled up an 8-1 lead on Friday before surviving a ninth-inning scare to win, 8-5. The Scarlet Raptors were led by the starting pitching of senior Ethan Carpenter, who raised his record to 5-1 with seven innings of seven-hit ball. He walked one and struck out four, while allowing only one first-inning run.
 
Senior Jacob Brennan pitched a scoreless eighth inning, issuing one walk and striking out three. Trailing, 8-1, Montclair State scored four runs (two earned) in the ninth on two hits, two walks and a pair of Raptor errors before senior Joey Rappaport relieved freshman Cian Phillips. After hitting his first batter to bring the tying run to the plate, Rappaport notched his first save of the season with a fly out to center field.
 
The Red Hawks used three hits to take a 1-0 lead in the first inning off Carpenter, but couldn't score off the righthander the rest of his outing. Rutgers-Camden, meanwhile, took the lead for good with four runs on five hits and two walks in the bottom of the third inning. Sophomore left fielder Jacob Watson opened the frame by beating out a high chopper to second base. He stole a base ahead of a walk to senior second baseman Danny Vasquez. Junior right fielder Steven Shaffer singled home Watson with the tying run. After a fly out advanced Vazquez to third, Shaffer stole second. Junior third baseman Jose Correa, senior designated hitter Jack Murphy and senior shortstop Billy Richards followed with RBI singles.
 
Rutgers-Camden added an unearned run in the sixth inning and tacked on three runs in the seventh on a single by Correa and RBI doubles by Murphy, freshman catcher Julian Gonzalez and Watson.
 
Junior first baseman Diego Salazar paced the 16-hit Scarlet Raptor attack with a 3-for-5 day, while Watson, Vazquez, Correa, Murphy and Richards all added two hits. Murphy had two RBIs and Watson scored twice and stole two bases, The steals raised his single-season program record to 38 and his career stolen base mark to 71.