The University of Maine’s softball team won only three America East regular season games this season, and two were home victories over Binghamton in a three-game series.
The Black Bears will look for a third win over the Bearcats at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday when they meet in the first round of the five-team double-elimination America East Tournament at the Pierre and Catherine Softball Complex on the UMaine campus in Orono.
The tournament is a five-team affair because the University of Maryland Baltimore County suspended its program after firing its head coach and her assistant-husband for inappropriate behavior. All five teams receive forfeit wins over UMBC.
Third seed Albany, 13-7 in the conference and 24-18 overall, will open the tourney at 11 a.m. against fourth seed UMass Lowell (11-10, 24-25).
Fifth seed UMaine (6-14, 13-34) meets second seed Binghamton (15-5, 16-24) next, and then league regular season champ Bryant (16-4, 20-21) will face the lowest seeded winner at 4 p.m.
Thursday’s first game will pit the losers of Wednesday’s first two games in an elimination game at 11 a.m. The winner of Wednesday’s third game will take on the highest seeded winner of Wednesday’s first two games at 1:30 p.m., and the 4 p.m. game will pit the winner of game four versus the loser of game three in an elimination game.
There will be a noon game on Friday, and the championship round game will begin at noon on Saturday.
The champion moves on to the NCAA Tournament.
The Bearcats are the league’s best hitting team with an average of .316, but they also have the highest earned-run average at 6.38.
They are led by Rachel Carey, who is hitting .478 with 10 homers, 18 doubles and 35 runs batted in.
She is complemented by Darien McDonough (.359-4-27), Emma Lawson (.340-5-21), Maddy Dodig (.333-3-30) and Elsa Allen (.317-16-44).
UMaine, which hit a league-low .232 and had a 5.93 ERA, has been paced by Kaelyn Larkin (.367-5-23), Keira Inman (.263-6-26), Neve Adams (.260-3-21), Eviana Robles (.258-1-16) and Francesca Guerrera (.252-2-15).
Binghamton took a pair of games from Maine in Vestal, New York, before the Black Bears took two of three in Orono.
