BANGOR, Maine — Jesse Colford pitched a one-hit shutout Saturday as Bangor’s Coffee News Comrades clinched a berth in the American Legion baseball state tournament with a 4-0 victory over top-ranked Post 51 of Oakland during a winners’ bracket game of the Zone 1 tournament at Husson University.
Skowhegan’s Post 16 also clinched a state tourney berth by winning two elimination games — 5-0 over the Acadians in Saturday’s first game and 6-2 over Post 51 in the late contest..
On Sunday, Bangor beat fourth-ranked Skowhegan 5-2 to win the Zone 1 title.
The state tournament begins Wednesday at the Capitol Area Recreation Association complex in Augusta.
Colford, a recent Bangor High School graduate who pitched in relief while helping the Rams win their third straight Class A state championship this spring, struck out 12 batters and walked no one. The righthander threw 119 pitches over nine innings, 82 for strikes.
Post 51’s lone hit was a first-inning single by Danny Pooler, the second batter Colford faced in the game.
Coffee News, which lost all three of its regular-season meetings to Post 51, took a 2-0 lead against Post 51 starter Dustin Brown in the top of the first.
Peter Kemble drew a one-out walk and Sam Huston singled. Derek Fournier followed with a two-out single, with Kemble scoring the game’s first run on an error on the play. Colford then walked before Huston scored on a wild pitch.
Kyle Stevenson hit a one-out triple in the Coffee News second and after a walk to Kemble scored on a single by Huston.
The Comrades scored their final run in the fifth. Andrew Hillier doubled and was sacrificed to third by Fournier. Nick Cowperthwaite later walked before Tyler Parke delivered a two-out RBI single.
Huston had three of Coffee News’ eight hits, while Fournier had two hits.
SKOWHEGAN 6, POST 51 2: Pitchers Dustin Crawford, Chase Malloy and Mike Berry held the defending zone champions in check as Skowhegan earned its berth in the state tournament.
Post 51 (17-6) did take a 1-0 third-inning lead on an RBI double by Danny Pooler, but Will Stinson’s RBI single in the fourth and a two-run double by Malloy in the fifth gave Skowhegan the lead for good.
Post 51 closed within 3-2 with an unearned run in the bottom of the fifth, but Cody Laweryson had an RBI single in the Skowhegan seventh and the winners added two unearned runs in the top of the ninth.
SKOWHEGAN 5, ACADIANS 0: Cody Laweryson allowed just two hits over eight innings as fourth-seeded Post 16 ousted No. 6 Acadians.
The University of Maine-bound righthander from Valley High School in Bingham struck out seven and walked three before getting ninth-inning relief help from Mike Berry.
Skowhegan capitalized on three Acadians’ errors to bolster its eight-hit offense.
Skowhegan scored twice in both the second and third innings to seize control.
Will Stinson singled and Evan Bess doubled with one out in the second, and both runners scored on a double error on Dustin Crawford’s grounder to third.
Singles by Brendan Curran and Adam Turcotte gave Skowhegan runners at first and second with one out in the third, and a groundout by Laweryson advanced both runners into scoring position. Stinson walked to load the bases before Bess hit an RBI single with a second run scoring after an error on the play.
Skowhegan added an insurance run in the eighth as Chase Malloy singled, was sacrificed to second by Turcotte and scored when Laweryson reached on an error.