PORTLAND, Maine — Keith Couch allowed just one run in eight innings, top Red Sox prospect Andrew Benintendi had two RBIs, and the Portland Sea Dogs won their second straight Eastern League baseball game over the New Hampshire Fisher Cats 5-3 Tuesday night at Hadlock Field.
New Hampshire scored the game’s first run on the top of the first on an RBI groundout by Dwight Smith, Jr. to score Roemon Fields. Couch wouldn’t allow another run after that.
Couch allowed one run on six hits in eight innings, walking three and striking out three. He becomes the first Sea Dog starter to work eight innings in a game since he did it back on Aug. 16, 2014 vs. Richmond.
Playing in his second career Double-A game, Benintendi finished with a single, double and two RBIs. He lined a single to left in the third off of John Anderson to score Tzu-Wei Lin, and later in the fifth laced a double off the wall in right-center to score Sean Coyle.
Nate Freiman followed up with a double of his own to extend the lead to 3-1. Freiman also added a sacrifice fly in the seventh to make it 5-1 Portland. Freiman now has nine RBIs in eight games with Portland.
New Hampshire got two more runs in the top of the ninth on a homer from Jorge Saez off of Simon Mercedes.