BREWER, Maine — Senior Night is a memorable occasion for any high school athlete, especially when it concludes with success against a rival.
For the 12 seniors on the Brewer High School baseball team, their postgame celebration Tuesday night couldn’t have been more special after righthander Jack Corey scattered four hits over 6 2/3 innings on the mound and the Witches used three unearned runs to defeat Bangor 3-1 at Heddericg Field.
“Whenever you play your rivals it just takes everything up that next notch,” said Corey, whose team avenged a 1-0 loss to the three-time defending Class A state champions back on April 24. “The adrenalin gets pumping, it’s just awesome.”
The win also assured Brewer (13-3) no worse than a second-place seeding in the final Class A North Heal point ratings, meaning coach Dana Corey’s club — which has played only two games on its home field this spring due to a soggy outfield — is assured up to two home postseason games when the regional tournament begins next week.
Bangor, which began the night ranked second in the division just ahead of Brewer, fell to 12-4 after falling for the third time in its last four games.
Coach Dave Morris’ club likely will finish fourth in the final A North standings after Edward Little of Auburn also moved ahead of the Rams with a 5-3 victory over No. 6 Lewiston on Tuesday night.
Jack Corey, the coach’s son, had seven strikeouts, three walks and hit a batter against Bangor in the teams’ mutual regular-season finale before reaching the 110-pitch limit with two outs and two on in the top of the seventh.
“I was just pounding the strike zone and trying to get it on the corners,” the senior said. “My fastball was going pretty good, the curveball was good once I got it going and my changeup just threw them off a little bit.”
Corey spotted Bangor a 1-0 lead in the top of the second on a leadoff double by Gary Farnham, a wild pitch and a sacrifice fly by Zach Ireland, but he allowed just two more runners to reach base before Alex Brooks came on in relief and retired the only batter he faced to earn the save.
“I was just getting more relaxed out there, trusting in my pitches, trusting in my defense and trusting in my catcher,” said Corey. “Alex (Maxsimic) called a really good game.”
Corey was backed by an eight-hit attack against Bangor righthander Peter Kemble, all from the bottom five batters in the Brewer lineup as Jon Wheaton, Josh Pellegrino, Jared Austin and Tyler Hersey each singled twice.
“They had a great night tonight, and they’ve been putting the bat on the ball better the last few games,” said coach Corey. “Sometimes you need that lower part of the order to do some things and that’s what happened tonight.”
Kemble struck out seven batters and walked two, but Bangor’s defense committed five errors, all as Brewer scored single runs in the third, fourth and fifth innings.
Hersey reached on an infield error to open the Brewer third, went to third base on an errant throw after Michael Bailey’s sacrifice bunt and scored the tying run on a sacrifice fly by Kobe Rogerson.
The Witches scored a two-out run an inning later to take the lead, with Pellegrino reaching second base on an infield error and scoring to make it 2-1 when Austin singled to left-center.
Maxsimic drew a one-out walk in the Brewer fifth, moved to third when Wheaton grounded a two-out single to right and scored the game’s final run when Corey reached on an infield error.
