The Husson Eagles baseball team dropped game one of their best of three NAC/CUNYAC championship series to Baruch University 5-3 on Saturday afternoon at the Winkin Complex in Bangor. The winner of the weekend three games series advances to the NCAA Division III baseball tournament.
Husson (26-15) scored first when Alex Chapman scored on a throwing error unearned in the fourth inning. The Bearcats from Baruch though scored four times in the fifth inning. Gerardo Roque hit a single to tie it, before Angelo Alessandro and Davic Capellan both scored on consecutive fielders choice plays. Jorge Mercado followed with an RBI single down the left field line to cap off the four run frame. Nicholas Veleraino added an RBI single in the seventh to make it 5-1. Brandon Smith pinch hit and doubled in a run in the eighth for Husson to cut it to 5-2, and David Leblanc lifted a sacrifice fly in the ninth to cut it to a two run game. The Eagles had two men on and one out in the ninth but couldn’t get any closer, forcing them to win two games in a row Sunday to win the series.
Nick Guerrette and Kobe Rogerson both had two hits to lead Husson who had their 10 game win streak snapped. Starting pitcher Jesse Colford (7-3) allowed five runs, seven hits, with two walks, and six strikeouts in 6.0 innings and suffered the loss. Veleraino and Liam O’Gara each had two hits for the City University of New York Athletic Conference champion Bearcats, who improve to 16-17. Paul Sirakowski (5-1) got the pitching win allowing two runs (none earned), 10 hits, with four walks, and four strikeouts in 8.0 innings. Nicholas D’Angelo got his third save allowing one run, one hit, with one walk, and one strikeout in an inning of work.
Game two of the series in Bangor is at 11 a.m. Sunday. If the Eagles win game one, game two will be played 30 minutes after the completion of the first game and will be a winner take all contest to advance to the national tournament.
