America East baseball News & Notes: Maine looks like the real deal

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There are now just four conference weekends left in America East for the 2022 season. One team already looks like a sure bet to be involved in the postseason baseball tournament come May. That team is the Maine Black Bears, who last weekend took a giant step forward in being the team to beat when the tournament takes place. Oh, by the way, they will also host the event as well. Unless things start to change between now and then, the favorite to win the whole thing is Maine. Now for the rest of what is going on in the league.

Maine (15-3) took on the UMass Lowell River Hawks (7-11) last weekend in Orono, Maine. The series was an indication of where these two teams are at the moment. Maine showed up with a six-game winning streak and had not lost a conference game since April 8, vs NJIT. The River Hawks arrived in Maine with series wins under their belts and a chance to create some separation between themselves and Albany. In the end, one team was ready for the challenge and one was not. UMass Lowell was swept in the series. walked off in two of those contests.

On Friday night, a strong start by LJ Keevan was wasted, as the River Hawks could not hold two one-run leads. The game would go extras and Lowell had one more chance to bust the game open. In the eleventh, with the bases loaded and one out, Lowell could not put the ball in play. Instead, they struck out twice to squander the rally. Maine would end it in the bottom of the eleventh on a base hit to right field by Ryan Turenne that scored Quinn McDaniel with the winning run in a 4-3 victory.

On Saturday, the Black Bears’ bats set the tone against Ryan Towle. A six-run third on four hits, two of them home runs, steered the home team to a 6-0 lead. Maine got great starting pitching from Caleb Leys who went the first six and no-hit the River Hawks before giving way to the pen. Noah Lewis gave the home fans a bit of a scare by allowing five runs in the seventh. But Maine held on for an 8-5 win.

On Sunday, with Joshua Becker on the bump for Lowell, the River Hawks had a 6-3 lead in the eighth. Jeremiah Jenkins (3-4, 2 RS, 3 RBI) hit a two-run homer to left to cut the lead to 6-5. In the ninth, against Sal Fusco, Maine would load the bases. A pitching change was made. It would do no good as Brendan Williams walked in the winning run in a 7-6 Black Bear win. Maine now has a nine-game winning streak and will host Hartford this weekend. Lowell will need to lick their wounds fast as they host Albany next weekend.

The Great Danes (7-11) played Hartford last weekend and they took the series winning two of three to jump ahead of Lowell in the standings heading into this weekend’s games. Friday night, Albany jumped all over Hartford pitching by scoring in seven of the nine innings on their way to a 19-8 win. The Great Danes banged out 22 hits, six went for extra-bases, including two for home runs off the bats of Johnny Marti in the fifth. Josh Loeffler added a three-run bomb. Ray Webber went six for his third win of the year yielding four runs on seven hits.

Hartford came back and evened the series on Saturday. The 12-7 win featured four HRs by the Hawks. Derek Tenney, Noah Rivers, Daniel Burnett, and Tyler Holmes all went deep as part of a 14-hit attack. Tim Blaisdell went the first five allowing three runs on eleven hits. Will Nowak picked up his first save of the season by going 1.1 innings of one-hit baseball.

On Sunday, Albany came back from down 4-0 after one to pick up a 7-5 win on the road. The Great Danes used two innings to get the job done. A three-run second was followed by a four-run fifth. Connor Eisenman came out of the Albany bullpen to pitch seven innings of two-hit, one-run baseball to improve to 4-2.

The race in division B is getting tighter thanks to NJIT going on a three-game losing streak and UMBC losing two of three. Binghamton (9-9) went on the road and swept the Highlanders (10-8). On Friday, the Bearcats survived a two-HR night by Luke Longo to take game one 7-5. Binghamton got key hits from Kevin Reilly in the eighth and Jake Evans in the ninth to get the win. Justin Rosner came on in relief to pitch two innings to get the win (2-1). Jack Collins pitched the ninth and recorded his fourth save.

Saturday saw the Bearcats down 3-0 to Jake Rappaport (1-4) in the seventh. Then, they exploded for six runs in the seventh, four of them off the bat of Erin Sullivan whose grand slam gave his team the lead for good. John Lumpinski picked up his first win of the year by going four innings of two-hit ball with ten strikeouts.

Sunday game saw the fourth inning do the Highlanders in. Binghamton scored three times after falling behind 1-0. Connor Aoki tied the game with a home run to right. Later in the frame with the bases loaded, Devan Bade singled up the middle to drive in two to give Binghamton the lead at 3-1. Ryan Bryggman went six innings to even his record at 3-3. Jack Collins picked up his second save of the weekend and his fifth of the year to complete the sweep of NJIT. Binghamton and UMBC meet this weekend in a very big series.

Maryland-Baltimore County (8-10) lost two of three from Stony Brook (11-7). Friday night saw the Seawolves take game one using the long ball to their advantage. Three home runs, Evan Giordano (3-4, 2 RS, 1 RBI) with a solo shot in the fourth, Ryan Mitchell with a bases-empty blast in the fifth, and Matt Brown-Eiring with one in the sixth, did the damage. It helped Stony Brook to a 6-5 win. Brendan Patterman improved to 4-0 with 2.2 innings of one-hit, one-run pitching. Devin Sharkey recorded save number two.

Saturday’s game saw UMBC even the series with a 10-3 victory. Two, two-run home runs by Tony Krueger in the seventh and Justin Taylor in the eighth took care of the offense. Nick Remy (1-1) took care of the pitching by going 6.1 IP of three-hit, one-run baseball.

On Sunday, the Seawolves finished the weekend with a 6-5 win. Cole Durkin’s two-run blast in the eighth off of Evan Selmer was the difference. Josh O’Neill (5-3) gets the win. The league and the nation’s leading hitter Myles Nicholson was held in check by Stony Brook. Nicholson went 4-for-12 with six runs scored. He is now hitting .430 with an OPS of 1.113.

Caleb Leys of Maine was the Pitcher of the Week for his six no-hit innings vs Lowell. Jeremiah Jenkins was the Player of the week with a slash line of .500/.647/1.167, two HR, 4 RBI, and 4 RS,

That’s our look at last week’s play. We will be back next week with more from America East Baseball.