Box Score BALTIMORE – UMBC junior
Jason Allinder (Snow Hill, Md./Snow Hill/Chesapeake CC) and senior
Max Himmelstein (Moorestown, N.J./Moorestown) each went 2-for-5 and drove in a run but the UMBC baseball team (10-42, 2-22 AE) could not come all the way back, losing 7-4 to Binghamton (22-24, 13-9 AE) in the season finale at the Baseball Factory Field on Saturday afternoon.
Binghamton scored two runs in the seventh and four more in the eighth to break open a pitcher's duel which was tied at one after six innings.
Senior Steve Miller (Newark, Del./Dickinson) (1-10) took the loss for the Retrievers after giving up seven runs on ten hits over eight and one thirds inning.
Reliever Mike Kauffman (1-2) earned the win for the visitors throwing two scoreless innings.
After a scoreless first inning, Binghamton got on the board in the top of the first as Daniel Nevaresled off the inning with a solo homerun, his second of the season. Nevares went 2-for-3 on Saturday and finished the three-game set batting .700 (7-for-10) against the Retrievers.
Two innings later the Retrievers knotted the game at one as senior Michael Pesci (Parsippany, N.J./DePaul Catholic) singled to left to drive in Himmelstein who had led off with a double.
Both Miller and Bearcat starter Jake Lynch buckled down afterwards, sending the opposition down without a run in the fifth and sixth.
Binghamton made the breakthrough in the seventh, however, scoring two runs on two hits against Miller. Just an inning later the visitors bolstered their lead to six, 7-1, by crossing the plate four times.
UMBC edged back in the bottom of the eighth as freshman Anthony Gatto (Hauppauge, N.Y./Smithtown West) homered to center to bring the hosts within five, 7-2.
In the last of the ninth, pinch hitter Ian Glassman (Basking Ridge, N.J./Rutgers Prep) started a rally for UMBC with a lead-off walk. Senior Curtis Schickner (East Windsor, N.J./Lawrenceville Prep) then stepped up and drilled a ball off the left field fence, nearly missing his first career homerun, to give the Retrievers runners on second and third with no outs. Binghamton then brought in Lee Sosa who got Allinder to ground out to second, but Glassman came home to cut the lead to 7-3. Himmelstein got the Retrievers even closer as he singled off the closer to drive around Schickner to make it 7-4. Sosa then calmed down getting a strikeout and a line out to end the game and earned his tenth save.
DAWG BITES
- With the win Binghamton sweeps the season series for the fourth straight season.
- UMBC is now 2-18 against team from New York this season and 1-15 against its America East Empire State rivals (1-3 vs. Albany; 1-2 vs. Army; 0-6 vs. Binghamton; 0-1 vs. Buffalo; 0-6 vs. Stony Brook).
- Miller recorded one strikeout to extend the Retrievers' streak to 66 consecutive games with at least one K.
- In the ninth, UMBC used three pitchers who each recorded an out by throwing a total of four pitches.
