After a successful 2014 season where the Fairfield Stags set a program record with 32 wins, the Stags were chosen to finish second in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference in the MAAC preseason poll for the first time in over 15 years. The Stags were set to travel to take on Georgetown for the first time since 1998, but due to record cold temperatures that also affected the East coast, the season’s opening series was cancelled. Just a week after having their opening series cancelled, the Stags experienced another cancellation against the defending Colonial Athletic Association regular season champions William & Mary. The Stags were two weeks into their season without playing an official game. Fairfield was one of just five teams in the country that had yet to play a regular season game.
It wasn’t until the team traveled to Florida for a 10-day trip where they were finally able to play their first game of the season against the North Florida Ospreys in early March. In this road trip, the Stags also faced off against the No. 1 ranked team in the country, University of Florida, and the No. 6 ranked team in the country, the University of Central Florida. Fairfield played a total of eight games and struggled to pick up a win as they went winless on the road trip. Although the Stags left Florida winless, they had lots to be excited about, like the pitching performance of Gavin Wallace ‘18 against Florida where he retired the first six batters for his first collegiate start and the offensive performance of Sebastian Salvo ‘15 on March 15 against Central Florida where he had a career-high of four RBIs.
Fairfield continued to struggle to get into the win column as they were 0-9. But when they faced off against the New York Institute of Technology Bears, the Fairfield offense exploded for 13 runs to get its first victory of the season. Salvo connected for his first career grand slam to lead the Stags offense. The Stags then traveled to the Bronx to face off against the Manhattan Jaspers for its first conference play. Through the first two games of the series, the team struggled to keep runs on the board as the Jaspers outscored Fairfield 16-5 through two games. With one loss away from yet another sweep, Fairfield had ace Mike Wallace ‘16 take the mound, where he pitched one of the best games in his collegiate career. Mike Wallace threw a two-hit complete game, shutout striking out seven, to give Fairfield their first MAAC win of the season. Mike Wallace was later named MAAC Pitcher of the Week for his performance against Manhattan. Fairfield ended the month of March on a high note as they won three of their last five games. After one full month of play, the Stags had a 5-13 record. Fairfield looked to improve in the upcoming month. But the team continued to struggle, as the Stags were only able to win a total of six games in the month of April. Fairfield came up short in 15 games in the month of April, even losing seven consecutive games against teams like Yale, Rider and the University of Connecticut.
With just less than a month remaining in the season, the Stags started the month of May defeating conference rival Saint Peter’s and the game against Sacred Heart University where Troy Scocca ‘17 won the game for the Stags in extra innings on a pinch-hit walk-off. Fairfield finished the season with a series against Siena in the friendly confines of Alumni Diamond, but dropped two of the three games to end the Stags season with a record of 17-32, 9-15 in conference play. Fairfield was not able to reach its full potential as they struggled for the majority of the season.
Once the season was over, members of the Fairfield men’s baseball team received recognition for their play. After a stellar year by Mike Wallace where he had a 2.64 ERA and struck out 39 batters in 58 innings pitched, the league’s coaches voted him as one of the best four pitchers in the league, naming Mike Wallace to the All-MAAC First Team. Mike Wallace is just one of 10 Stags that was named to the MAAC All-Academic Team. On top of receiving such a huge honor, on June 10, 2015, the Pittsburgh Pirates selected Mike Wallace with the 907th pick of the 2015 MLB Amateur Draft.
Fairfield graduated 11 seniors from 2015 roster. Fairfield did not meet the expectations they were projected to achieve, but they look to improve in the upcoming season.
Leave a Reply