Zach Quintal’s two-run triple with two outs in the 10th inning gave the University of Southern Maine a come-from-behind 12-10 win over host SUNY Cortland in the New York NCAA Division III Baseball Regional at Falcon Park in Auburn, New York.
USM, now 30-14 overall and 3-1 in the tournament, faced unbeaten Swarthmore College (Pa.) in a championship round later Sunday night needing a win to force a Monday championship game.
Swarthmore advanced to the championship round with a 9-6 win over USM on Saturday as Charles Levitt snapped a 6-6 tie with a run-scoring triple in a three-run eighth-inning rally and scored an insurance run on a Cole Beeker single.
The Garnet’s 13th straight win improved their record to 36-9 overall and 3-0 in the tournament.
In Sunday’s game, USM rallied from an 8-3 deficit with five unearned runs in the seventh and then erased a 10-8 deficit with two runs in the ninth to force extra innings.
In the 10th, Kyle Heath hit a one-out single and Kaleb Bridgham followed with a single. Sam Troiano grounded out but Quintal tripled to right center to break the tie.
In the ninth, Andrew Hillier’s two-run double with no outs tied it after Anthony Degifico and Troiano had singled and Quintal was hit by a pitch.
USM had scored all five of its seventh-inning runs with two outs as Troiano had a two-run triple and Heath, Degifico and Quintal had RBI singles.
Marcos Perivolaris’ two-run single in the bottom of the seventh gave Cortland a 10-8 lead.
Quintal and Troiano had three hits each for USM and Heath, Degifico and Andrew Olszak had two each. Quintal drove in three runs and Troiano had two RBIs. Joe Tardif had four hits for 35-12 SUNY Cortland while Antonio Pragana, Matthew Personius and Perivolaris had three apiece and Matt Michalski had two. Perivolaris had four RBIs.
SUNY Cortland had squandered a 9-1 lead earlier Sunday before beating Baldwin-Wallace (Ohio) 10-9 in 11 innings.
On Saturday, USM scored a pair of seventh-inning runs to tie the game 6-6.
But A.J. Liu started the decisive eighth-inning rally when USM closer Jake Dexter hit him with a pitch. Levitt then tripled past a diving USM outfielder.
Beeker singled sharply down the first base line to score Levitt before being sacrificed to second, advancing to third on a fly ball and scoring on Jaren Gillen’s base hit.
USM had tied it in the seventh when Quintal was hit by a pitch, Andrew Hillier, Dexter and Tanner Laberge followed with singles and Olszak hit a sacrifice fly.
The Huskies built a 4-1 lead with single runs in the second and third innings and two more in the fourth.
Two infield errors produced the second-inning run; singles by Dexter and Olszak and Devin Warren’s sacrifice fly made it 2-0 in the third and a walk, Heath’s double, Quintal’s RBI groundout and Hillier’s RBI single made it 4-1 in the fourth.
But back-to-back homers by Gillen and Coleson Hebble in the bottom of the fourth off Gage Feeney cut the lead to 4-3 and Swarthmore took the lead in the fifth at the expense of Colton Lawrence and Dexter on an RBI single by Beeker and a run-producing wild pitch.
Liu singled home a sixth-inning run to expand the lead to 6-4.
Liu, Levitt, Beeker, Jackson Roberts, Conor Elliott and Gillen each had two hits for the winners and Jack Corkery picked up the win in relief with 2 2/3 innings of no-hit shutout relief.
Hillier and Dexter had two hits apiece for USM.
USM had advanced to the winners bracket game with a 1-0 win over Salisbury University (Md.) on Friday as Ben Lambert and Dexter teamed up on a seven-hitter and Quintal doubled home a seventh-inning run.
Lambert struck out seven and walked two over 7 2/3 innings before Dexter pitched the final 1 1/3, not allowing a hit and striking out two.
USM managed just three hits. Scott Ardoin had three hits for Salisbury.
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