Offense Gets Going Late as Mainers Beat SwampBats
June 12, 2024 - New England Collegiate Baseball League (NECBL)
Sanford Mainers News Release
Sanford Mainers' Jack Toomey on game night
(, Credit: Madison Giltner Photography)
KEENE, N.H. - For the second time in the past five days, the Sanford Mainers and Keene SwampBats played at Alumni Field. On Wednesday night, the scoreboard nearly matched what it read on Saturday night as the Mainers came away with the 7-2 win.
Sanford and Keene both stranded two runners on base in the first inning as Freddy Beruvides Jr. (Virginia) and Bijan Anvar (Franklin & Marshall) worked around trouble.
In the top of the second, Blake Schaaf (Georgetown) led off with a double for the Mainers. After two Beruvides retired the next two batters, it looked as if Sanford's season-long troubles with runners in scoring position were going to continue.
Jorge Burgos (Southern New Hampshire) did not let that happen though as he worked a two-out walk to keep the inning alive. Burgos' base on balls allowed for the top of the lineup and Matt Miceli (Stony Brook) to come back to the plate.
Miceli, who grounded out to begin the game, delivered an opposite-field single that put Sanford ahead 1-0, a score that did not change for quite some time.
Anvar worked another scoreless inning in the bottom of the frame before Beruvides issued a leadoff walk to C.J. Willis (Quinnipiac). That walk ended the night for the left-handed pitcher as Sean McKenna turned the ball over to Josh Gunther (Wake Forest).
Gunther stranded both Willis and Ray Velazquez (Vanderbilt), who Gunther issued a free pass, on base to end the third. In the process of working around the walks, Gunter struck out three Sanford hitters.
Those three hitters were the first of seven strikeouts for Gunter as he worked three innings of no-hit baseball out of the bullpen.
The Alabama native left the mound in the fifth inning, which was his third and final inning of work, with Sanford still leading 1-0.
By the time the new pitcher, Dane Burns (Mississippi State) entered in the sixth, the SwampBats had the lead.
Daniel McAliney (Binghamton), who came into the game in relief of Anvar, yielded a one-out walk to Nicholas Romano (Florida Atlantic) in the bottom of the fifth. Still with one out in the inning, the right-handed pitcher allowed a single to Alex Alicea (Louisville) to put two runners on the basepaths.
Joe Jaconski (Penn State) drove in Romano, who reached third base on a wild pitch, on a groundout to Miceli at shortstop. Jaconski's collegiate teammate Bryce Molinaro (Penn State) followed with a walk to effectively end the relief appearance of McAliney.
The first pitch from Josh Kopetski (Rhode Island) bounced to the backstop allowing Alicea to score the go-ahead run.
After both Burns and Kopetski combined to work a scoreless sixth inning, Sanford's lineup attacked Burns, who allowed two earned runs in his previous appearance against Sanford on Saturday, in the top of the seventh.
Miceli and Jared Davis (Virginia Tech) started the seventh with back-to-back singles. On Davis' single, which was his third of the game, an error by Burns allowed Miceli to move 90 feet away from home plate.
Willis was retired for the first time in nine plate appearances against Keene, bringing up Jack Toomey (Holy Cross) with two runners on. Toomey unleashed an opposite field double that scored both Miceli and Davis, who had advanced to second on his sixth stolen base of the year, and gave the Moose a 4-2 lead.
Following Beau Brailey's (Alabama) scoreless inning in the bottom of the frame, in which he worked around a bases-loaded jam with a strikeout of Molinaro, the Mainers offense kept rolling in the top of the eighth.
Burgos reached base on his second walk of the contest before stealing second base. Davis moved Burgos up with a single, his fourth of the game, to put runners on the corners.
With Willis at the plate, Davis stole second base, and a low throw from J.D. Jones (Rutgers) allowed Burgos to break for home plate. Burgos scored with ease, extending Sanford's lead to 5-2.
Willis' at-bat concluded with him rounding the bases and he unleashed a 375-foot home run to center field to put the Mainers ahead 7-2. It was Willis' second home run against Keene, both of which went to center field at Alumni Field, and it was the fourth time he reached base in the contest following three walks to start his night.
Jackson Walsh (Wheaton College) allowed hits in both the eighth and ninth inning, but nothing came of it for the SwampBats as the right-handed pitcher closed out the 7-2 victory.
The win moved Sanford back over .500 with a doubleheader with Upper Valley looming on Thursday afternoon. Both games of the doubleheader will stream exclusively on ESPN+ beginning at 4 p.m.
Images from this story
 Sanford Mainers' Jack Toomey on game night (Madison Giltner Photography) |
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