UMBC

MANSFIELD, Conn.—The UMBC baseball team dropped a twinbill to Maine on Saturday at Eastern Connecticut State University Baseball Stadium.  The Black Bears (9-19, 4-4 America East) completed a four-game sweep of the Retrievers (8-21, 0-8 America East) with 3-1 and 8-1 wins on Saturday.

Junior Will Delawter led the Retrievers, scoring the lone run in game 1 of the doubleheader and batting in their only run in game two, while senior Tom Rinaldi batted in Delawter in game 1 and junior Joe Fowler scored the only run in game two.

Freshman Marty Zawacki (2-4) took the first loss, giving up three runs, four hits, and striking out two in 6.0 innings, while senior Bo Sauter (1-1) went 5.2 innings while giving up three runs, seven hits, walking four, and striking out three in game two.

Greg Norton pitched the complete seven-inning game in the first contest of the day for the Black Bears, giving up eight hits and just one run and striking out two, while Alejandro Balsinde pitched the complete nine-inning affair that follower, letting up just five hits and one run while striking out four and walking none.

The Black Bears took a quick, 2-0 lead in the first inning of game 1 off Matt McGraw’s ground-out RBI and Joel Barrett’s solo homer, but the Retrievers cut that lead to one off Rinaldi’s RBI single that plated Delawter.  The Black Bears added one more in the sixth off a McGraw single.

Game two saw a pitcher’s duel for the first five innings, with a combined six hits between the two teams during that time.  The Retrievers opened up the scoring in the top of the sixth off Delawter’s RBI single that scored Fowler, but the Black Bears quickly answered with three runs in the bottom of the inning and then added five more in the bottom of the eighth to put the Retrievers away, 8-1.

The Retrievers return to action when they host University of Maryland sister school College Park on Tuesday night at 7:00 p.m. at The Baseball Factory Field at UMBC.