As the bottom of the inning began with Harvard down 2-0, Walsh anxiously paced the lip of his dugout, loudly urging his hitters to try to chase Providence's southpaw starter Ryan Lewis. It worked.

The Crimson put four runs on the board in the second, all on hard-hit balls. After senior catcher Jason Keck reached on an error, Bridich brought him home with a screaming double into the left-centerfield gap.

San Salvador followed with a single, and senior Andrew Huling knotted the game on a fielder's choice grounder to third. With Lewis already seemingly shaken, sophomore Scott Carmack and junior Eric Binkowski did the eight and nine spots in the order proud, tacking on a pair of RBI base knocks to the Crimson rally.

"All season we've been a little timid to swing the bats, and then today we just came out and said, 'Hey, we're going to have to hit with these guys,'" said Mager, who was hit on the back of the arm with a pitch near the end of the second.

The Crimson failed to reach the Friar bullpen after its initial four-run spurt, but Providence may have been better off if it had removed Lewis after the second.

Though Mager played only a supporting role in the second, he was the leading man of the next inning's drama. Giampaolo held the Friars scoreless in the top of the third, and Mager highlighted the bottom of the frame with a three-run blast to left.

Abandoning the gentle pecking that led to its first four runs, Harvard's seven third-inning scores came in bunches. A Keck walk and a pair of singles by Bridich and San Salvador loaded the bases for Huling, who tried to unload them with a sharp grounder to the right side.