MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. - Eastern Baseball began its 2025 Spring Break schedule Tuesday with an 8-3 win over Houghton University at Ebbets Field at the Cal Ripken Experience. The Eagles (3-3) rode a five-run sixth inning and a stellar outing from sophomore Graham Adams to their third win of the young season.

Adams (1-0) threw six strong innings of two-run ball, giving up six hits while recording four strikeouts on 115 pitches. The Lumberton, N.J. native also recorded nine flyouts and three groundouts and two groundouts in his first win of the season. Eastern's bullpen of Brady Bollman, Cody Bergeron, and Ethan Gwara pitched the final three frames, allowing just one unearned run.

The Eagles recorded 10 hits on the afternoon. Justin DiCesare finished 3-for-4 at the dish with an RBI, Brian Lang recorded a pair of doubles, and first-year catcher JJ Matos recorded a two-run single in Eastern's five-run sixth frame.

After a 1-2-3 first inning, Adams and the Eagles escaped a bases-loaded jam in the second to keep the game scoreless. With one out, Adams induced a grounder to Leyton Bamesbeger, and the combination of him, Logan Klember, and Luke Meehan turned a 4-6-3 double play to end the Houghton scoring threat.

Eastern struck first in the bottom half of the third inning. Despite some base-running miscues early in the frame, Matthew Gonglik delivered with two outs, hitting an RBI single to center field to score Meehan and give the Eagles a 1-0 lead.

With the Highlanders (1-3) threatening to score in the fourth, the Eagles ended the frame with another excellent defensive sequence. On a single to right field from Houghton's Santa Ueno, Lang fired the ball to home plate to keep Mason Sutherland from scoring, and the relay from Matos to Klember was perfectly timed to tag Ueno out as he tried for extra bases.

With the momentum on their side, the Eagles scored two more runs in the bottom of the fourth inning. DiCesare led off the frame with a single, and Lang's first double put runners at second and third with nobody out. Leyton Bamesberger and Klember followed with an RBI groundout to shortstop and an RBI single to right-center field, respectively, to increase Eastern's advantage to 3-0.

Houghton closed the gap to 3-2 in the fifth frame on a two-run double from Vincent Lucyszyn, but the Eagles took control of the contest in the sixth. With the bases loaded, Meehan worked a bases-loaded walk for Eastern's fourth run, before Matos roped a two-run single to left field to make it 6-2 Eastern. Meehan later scored on a balk, and DiCesare capped off the scoring with an RBI single to center field, scoring Matos.

Bollman, Bergeron, and Gwara shut down the Houghton lineup the rest of the way. Bollman pitched a clean seventh, Bergeron worked around an Eastern fielding error to allow only one run in the eighth, and Gwara pitched a 1-2-3 ninth to secure the victory for the Eagles.

Eastern will be back in action tomorrow morning against local foe Valley Forge. First pitch is set for 10:00 am.