The University of Maine’s baseball team has put itself in position to earn one of the coveted top two seeds for the six-team America East Tournament on May 20-23 by taking two of three from league leader Binghamton in New York over the weekend.
It is the sixth straight weekend UMaine has won two of three games, including its last five conference series. It also had a non-conference weekend when it beat Northeastern and Merrimack while also losing a game to Northeastern.
The top two seeds earn a first-round bye to the tournament, which evolves into a four-team double-elimination affair after the losers of the first-round games are eliminated.
UMaine sandwiched 9-2 and 7-3 victories on Friday and Sunday, respectively, around an 8-7 11-inning loss on Saturday.
UMaine is in second place with an 11-7 conference record, which puts the Black Bears two games behind 13-5 Binghamton, half a game ahead of third-place Bryant (12-9) and one full game ahead of number four the University of Maryland Baltimore County (10-8).
Rounding out the standings are Albany (8-10), UMass Lowell (6-12) and the New Jersey Institute of Technology (6-15).
UMaine’s final six conference games will be at the Black Bears’ Mahaney Diamond with UMass Lowell visiting Orono for three games this weekend and Albany coming for three the following weekend.
The Black Bears and River Hawks will play at 4 p.m. Friday, 3 p.m. Saturday and noon Sunday.
Binghamton plays its final six on the road with three at Albany and three at UMass Lowell; Bryant concludes its conference play by hosting UMBC this weekend; UMBC hosts NJIT for three after travelling to Bryant; and Albany finishes up by entertaining Binghamton and trekking to Orono.
On Sunday at the Bearcats Baseball Complex, senior Vaun Larisa threw six innings of three-hit,one-run baseball, and freshman first baseman Hunter St. Denis belted a two-run homer as the Black Bears took the rubber game of the three-game set.
Larisa struck out three and walked three and improved to 3-3 on the campaign.
Sophomore Brennan Rumpf allowed two runs in two innings of work before redshirt senior Sebastian Holt pitched a scoreless ninth inning.
St. Denis’ two-run homer to left in the third inning, following a walk to fellow freshman Troy Carpenter, broke a 1-1 tie, and senior Chris Bear added an RBI single later in the inning.
St. Denis’ homer was his eighth of the season.
UMaine made it 7-1 with three more in the fourth on junior Albert De La Rosa’s two-run single and Bear’s sacrifice fly.
St. Denis, Brody Rasmussen, Quinn Murphy, Bear and Shane Andrus each had two hits for the Black Bears.
Zack Kent had a two-run single for Binghamton.
On Saturday, run-scoring singles by Grant Hunter and Tommy Popoff in the bottom of the 11th enabled the Bearcats to rally for the victory.
Back-to-back doubles by Rasmussen and De La Rosa to lead off the top of the 11th had given UMaine a 7-6 lead. But UMaine couldn’t do any further damage.
UMaine erased a pair of two-run deficits and sent the game into extra innings with a run in the top of the ninth on Andrus’ RBI single with no outs. That also put runners on first and second but UMaine couldn’t produce another run.
Steven Kraus went four-for-four with a double for Binghamton, Mike Stellrecht hit a two-run homer, his second of the campaign, and Popoff had two singles and two RBIs.
Rasmussen and De La Rosa each had a double and two singles for UMaine and De La Rosa knocked in three runs. Graduate student JuJu Stevens walloped his 12th homer of the season, a two-run shot, in the eighth inning.
In Friday’s opener, St. Denis and Nic Pepe each homered twice and combined to drive in six runs to key the win.
Redshirt junior righty Jason Krieger tossed eight innings of six-hit, one-run ball with four strikeouts and one walk.
St. Denis’ solo homer in the fourth snapped a 1-1 tie and gave UMaine the lead for good and Pepe made it 5-1 with a three-run shot in the fifth inning.
Pepe’s homer was his fifth of the season and second of the game as he had hit a solo shot in the first.
Andrus hit a two-run double in the eighth and St. Denis clubbed his second homer of the game in the ninth.
St. Denis had a double and single to go with his two homers and had two RBIs. Pepe delivered four runs with his homer and a base hit.
Andrus had two singles to go with his double and De La Rosa had a pair of base hits.
Kraus hit a solo homer for Binghamton, his fifth of the season.
