Baseball Begins NESCAC Play With Series at Tufts

BRENT SCHOELLER ’21
CONTRIBUTING WRITER

The baseball team travelled to Medford, Mass. on Friday to begin NESCAC league play against the Tufts University Jumbos.  They played three games against the Jumbos, including a doubleheader on Saturday. The team came away with two wins and a loss.  The trip was a success for Trinity, as they won the series against the Jumbos to begin league play on a good note.    The Bantams first game against Tufts was an incredibly exciting win in a

game that went down to the wire.  Trinity struck first with a run in the top of the 1st inning from Johnny Stamatis ’19 who was driven in on a double from Matt Koperniak ’20.  The Bantams then added another run in the 6th and two more runs in the top of the 7th before the Jumbos bats began to get hot.  Starting pitcher Erik Mohl ’19 did a terrific job allowing only two hits and no runs through six innings of work, but after he gave up two runs in the bottom of the 7th he was pulled.  The Jumbos added another run before the end of the inning to make it a 4-3 ball game.  The visiting Bantams then added single runs in both the 8th and 9th innings respectively, which would become crucial to the outcome.  The Jumbos would have an answer in the bottom of the 9th with two two-out runs before veteran closer McLane Hill ’18 got a strikeout to seal the win for the Bantams and earn his fourth save of the season.

The second game of the trip and the first of Saturday’s doubleheader was another exciting win for the Bantams.  The most impressive performance of the game came from Bantam starting pitcher Alex Shafer ’20 who only allowed one earned run in 6 and 2/3rd innings.  The Jumbos would be the first to score in this game with two runs in the 5th inning, only one of those runs being earned.  However, with a great top of the 6th inning the Bantams took an insurmountable lead.  The Bantams responded to the Jumbos run with five runs of their own in the top of the 6th.  Most impressive would be the bases-loaded triple from catcher Alex Rodriguez ’20 which put the score at 4-2. They added another run after that to stretch the lead to 5-2.  Then, with two-outs in the bottom of the 7th and runners on first and second, the Bantams coaching staff replaced Alex Shafer ’20 with closer McLane Hill ’18 who struck out the last batter to clinch the win and his fifth save of the year.

Unfortunately, the third game of the trip was not the result the Bantams were looking for.  After one run in the 2nd and three runs in the 4th from the Jumbos, Trinity was unable to claw their way back.  The Bantams got on the board with one run in the 6th from Koperniak on an error.  They then added another run in the 8th on a sacrifice-fly from Cooper Mooney ’18 that allowed Koperniak to score again. The comeback wasn’t enough and the final score was 4-2 in favor of the Jumbos. Next up for Trinity baseball is a road game at Dean College on April 4.