BANGOR, Maine — Jake Dexter’s RBI single with one out in the bottom of the ninth inning Sunday drove home Devin Warren to cap off a two-run rally as top-seeded Post 51 of Oakland won the American Legion Zone 1 baseball championship with a 4-3 victory over No. 2 Coffee News of Bangor at Husson University.
The win was the third straight in the double-elimination tournament for Post 51 (18-5) since a loss to Coffee News on Friday night, and both finalists will advance to the state Legion tournament that begins Wednesday at the Wainwright Complex in South Portland.
“We’re both in the state tournament, so that doesn’t mean that much that way,” said Dexter, “but it’s nice to win a championship.”
Post 51, which won the Zone 2 tournament title last summer before being shifted to Zone 1 after the former Zone 2 was disbanded, will open states with a 10:30 a.m. game against Tri-Town of Poland (13-10), runner-up of the reconfigured Zone 2.
Defending state champion Coffee News (15-7) will play its first state tournament game at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday against Zone 2 titlist Bessey Motors (19-3) of South Paris — a rematch of last year’s state championship game.
Coffee News rallied from a 2-0 deficit against Post 51 — which includes current and former players from Messalonskee of Oakland, Lawrence of Fairfield, Waterville and Winslow high schools — to take a 3-2 lead into the bottom of the ninth.
Dylan Hapworth led off with a double to left-center, and Warren greeted Coffee News’ third pitcher of the game, Jesse Colford, with an infield hit to shortstop.
Jonathan Wilkie, making his first plate appearance of the game, laid down a sacrifice bunt, and when Coffee News failed to cover first base quickly enough, an errant throw enabled Hapworth to score from second base and Warren to reach third.
“The bunt was huge in that inning,” said Post 51 coach Rusty Mercier. “Jonathan didn’t show it until late. It was a sacrifice bunt, but even though it was a bunting situation, I think they were a little caught off guard. They didn’t have a kid covering first, and we scored a run on that, and then everything’s going our way.”
After an intentional walk to Trevor Gettig that loaded the bases and a strikeout, Dexter ripped a 1-0 pitch off the glove of Coffee News third baseman Ben Crichton to deliver Warren with the winning run.
“I wanted to hit the ball hard,” said Dexter, “just free swing and get a hit to get that run in.”
Dexter also earned the pitching win with three innings of one-hit relief in support of starter A.J. Godin, who worked six innings on two days rest and yielded three runs on seven hits.
Warren paced Post 51’s nine-hit offense with three singles and two runs scored while Dexter singled twice.
Kyle Stevenson tripled and singled twice with two RBIs for Coffee News of Bangor, while Sam Huston doubled and singled as part of the Comrades’ eight-hit offense.
Coffee News starter Andrew Hillier yielded one earned run on five hits over five innings before giving way to Nick Cowperthwaite, who was charged with one run on two hits in three-plus innings.
“It was a good game for us,” said Coffee News coach Dave Morris. “We made some mistakes and put ourselves in a situation where we gave them a couple of runs, but they’re a great baseball team, and we knew we had to play our best baseball.”
Post 51 struck first in the bottom of the first as Dan Pooler had a one-out infield hit, stole second and scored when the Coffee News defense miscommunicated on Zach Mathieu’s popup to shallow right field and the ball fell in for an RBI single.
The Central Maine team made it 2-0 an inning later as Warren hit a leadoff single, reached third on a stolen base and a throwing error and scored on Cody Martin’s groundout.
Godin shut out Coffee News on four hits through five innings before the Comrades broke through in the top of the sixth.
Hillier hit a leadoff single to center and went to second on a walk to Peter Kemble. Pinch-hitter Marcus McCue then sacrificed the runners to second and third before Stevenson stroked a two-run single to center that tied the game.
Stevenson advanced to third on Cowperthwaite’s two-out pinch single to right field, then scored on a wild pitch to give Bangor a 3-2 lead.
On Saturday night, Post 51 staked recent Waterville High School graduate Danny Pooler to a 3-0 lead in the second inning, and the right-hander went on to yield just one unearned run on six hits with five strikeouts, two walks and two hit batters for the 5-1 over Coffee News.
Devin Warren worked a 1-2-3 ninth for Post 51.
Coffee News mounted its first threat against Pooler in the top of the second, getting runners to second and third base with two outs before Post 51 center fielder Devin Warren made an inning-ending diving catch of Johnny Cote’s line drive toward the right-center field gap.
A one-out RBI single by Derek Bowen and a two-out ground single through the shortstop hole by Jake Dexter that plated two runs gave Post 51 a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the second. That rally also was fueled by three walks by Bangor starter James Prescott.
Prescott went on to retire nine of 10 batters he faced through the end of the fifth, but Coffee News was unable to capitalize offensively against Pooler until manufacturing an unearned run in the top of the sixth.
Trevor DeLaite opened the inning with a bunt single down the third-base line, stole second and scored on a throwing error after a fielder’s choice grounder by Andrew Hillier to make it 3-1.
In Saturday’s first game, Post 51 clinched its berth in the state tournament by defeating Brewer 8-5 in an elimination game.
Brewer (15-7) jumped out to a 3-1 lead through 1½ innings against Post 51 starter Cody Martin, but Martin then held the Falcons hitless from the third inning through the seventh while Post 51 gradually pulled ahead with a run in the bottom of the third and two runs in both the fifth and sixth innings off Brewer starter Carter DeRedin.
Coffee News (15-6) 000 001 00 — 1 6 3
Post 51 (17-5) 030 000 20x — 5 8 1
Prescott, Peirce (6), Colford (7) and Huston; Pooler and Folsom
Brewer (15-7) 120 000 020 — 5 7 1
Post 51 (16-5) 101 022 11x — 8 15 1
Martin, Warren (8) and Gettig; DeRedin, Maxsimic (8) and Maxsimic, DeRedin (8)
Coffee News (15-7) 000 002 000 — 2 8 2
Post 51 (18-5) 110 000 002 — 4 9 0
Hillier, Cowperthwaite (6), Colford (9) and Huston; Godin, Dexter (7) and Gettig
