The University of Maine’s baseball team rebounded from a devastating loss to Binghamton earlier in the day by pounding out 16 hits and receiving 6 ⅔ innings of five-hit, one-relief from senior righthander Pierce Friedman to oust the University of Maryland Baltimore County, 11-6, in an America East Tournament elimination game at Binghamton’s Bearcats Baseball Complex in Vestal, New York, Friday night.
Third seed UMaine, 3-1 in the tournament and 24-31 overall, will now have to beat top seed and defending champ Binghamton (2-0, 30-20) twice on Saturday to win the tournament with the first game slated for a 1 p.m. start. However, projected inclement weather could change the time.
Binghamton had rallied for two runs with two outs in the bottom of the ninth to edge UMaine 6-5 in an afternoon affair.
In Friday’s second game, the Black Bears took a 7-0 lead in the first inning and never looked back although the second-seeded Retrievers did cut it to 7-5 after two innings.
Junior catcher Shane Andrus had his first four-hit game of the season and drove in four runs for the Black Bears including two with a single in the first inning.
Albert De La Rosa had a two-run double in the first, Troy Carpenter and Brody Rasmussen each had a run-scoring double and Nic Pepe singled home a run.
Danny Orr’s two-run double highlighted a three-run bottom of the first for 29-24 UMBC and Dylan Melton singled home a run in a two-run second-inning rally.
But Friedman, who has now allowed only three earned runs in his last nine outings spanning 30 ⅔ innings, came on in relief of Gianni Gambardella and got a double play grounder to end the second and didn’t allow a run until Derek Paris hit a solo homer in the eighth, his second of the season.
Friedman, now 4-1, struck out two and walked two before Tommy Martin came on to retire all three hitters he faced in the ninth..
UMaine made it 8-5 with a run in the third on Quinn Murphy’s double and Rasmussen’s sacrifice fly and added two more in the fourth on singles by Pepe and Hunter St, Denis and Andrus’ two-run double.
Freshman third baseman Carpenter hit his league-leading 16th homer of the season in the top of the eighth.
Carpenter had a single to go with his homer and double and has now driven in a team-high 53 runs. De La Rosa had two doubles, Murphy doubled and singled and St. Denis had two singles.
Melton had two doubles and a single for UMBC and Kyle Eddington had a pair of base hits.
