Keene State Owl Jake Jachym pitched seven innings of two run ball and Iona Gael Cole Silvia had three hits and drove in three runs as the Westfield Starfires defeated the Nashua Silver Knights 6-2 on Tuesday, June 24 at Bullens Field.
The Starfires get to 7-16 on the season after beating a Nashua squad that had won six of their past seven heading into today’s game. The Silver Knights fall to 12-10.
After a scoreless first inning, Northeastern product Anthony Ruggiero led off the bottom of the second with a single as the game’s first base hit. Keene State’s Jonathan Chatfield then walked, and a softly hit ground ball moved both runners into scoring position.
Silvia was next up and chopped a slow grounder to third. The Wilton, Connecticut native beat out the throw to first and to complicate matters more for Nashua, the ball got into right field and the Starfires got two runs in the inning on the single and throwing error.
Meanwhile, Jachym on the hill for the Starfires looked every bit like the 2025 Pitcher of the Year in the Little East Conference he earned this spring, by beginning the first two innings perfectly with three strikeouts.
However, in the third, the Silver Knights tagged him for a single, followed by another single that was bobbled around in the outfield, scoring the runner from first with the error as Nashua cut the gap to 2-1.
In the fourth, the Starfires added an insurance run after the inning began with a kicked ground ball from the Silver Knights. Westfield took advantage of the misplay a few batters later when Silvia delivered a two-out double down the right-field line to score the Starfires third run.
Nashua got this run back in the top of the fifth with a two-out double followed by a single on a ball ever so slightly out of the reach of Menzel at short. With the runner off on contact scoring, the Silver Knights trimmed their deficit to 3-2.
Jachym continued to roll, and in the bottom of the sixth, his teammates gave him even more of a cushion. The Starfires sent nine players to the dish in the frame with three hits: a double from Chatfield, who later came home via a wild pitch, a run-scoring single from Silvia, and an RBI single from Boston College product, John Mass. Along with the help of Nashua, who committed their fifth error and gave Westfield two free passes, the Starfires doubled their run total for a 6-2 lead.
The Starfires held onto their 6-2 lead into the ninth, completely shutting down the Nashua offense as the Silver Knights had just one baserunner in the final three innings, that being a hit-by-pitch in the seventh. Stonehill’s Tanyon Weber set down the side in order in the ninth, and the Starfires started the week off right with a win at Bullens.
Silvia has now gone 5-for-7 in his past two games with a triple and a double, racking up five RBIs. He has raised his batting average from .143 to .257 with his two most recent performances. Mass was 2-for-5 with an RBI, and both Chatfield and Ohio Bobcat Alex Benevento scored twice. The Starfires had multiple runners on base in five of the innings of tonight’s ball game.
Jachym’s final stats were seven innings, six hits, five strikeouts, and zero walks. The third-year Starfire becomes the first pitcher in franchise history to reach 10 career wins with the team. Weber pitched flawless eighth and ninth innings in relief of Jachym, dropping his ERA to 3.00 in nine innings on the bump.
The Starfires will be back at Bullens Field tomorrow, June 24, for a matchup against the New Britain Bees for Bark in the Park Night and a Tito’s Dog Bandana giveaway presented by MGT Bank. First pitch is slated for 6:30 p.m.
