ORONO, Maine — After squandering a 6-2 lead in a regular season-ending 12-7 loss to America East regular season champion Hartford on Saturday, the University of Maine’s Black Bears will now play the opening game in the league tournament at 11 a.m. Wednesday at Mahaney Diamond in Orono.
UMaine, which finished the season 12-12 in the league and 18-32 overall, will be the fifth seed and will play fourth seed Stony Brook, 12-12 and 29-23.
Stony Brook earned the higher seed because the Seawolves won the tiebreaker by taking two of three from UMaine in Orono on April 7-8.
UMass Lowell, 13-11 and 24-27, beat Stony Brook 5-3 on Saturday morning to earn the second seed and a first-round bye along with Hartford (16-8, 23-29).
This is the first season Lowell has been eligible for the tournament after serving a four-year probationary period required by the NCAA after moving up to Division I from Division II.
Defending AE tournament champ the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (12-11, 22-27), the third seed, will face sixth seed Albany (9-14, 19-26) in the second game on Wednesday at 2:30 p.m.
The two teams split a Sunday doubleheader in Baltimore.
The losers of games one and two will play an elimination game at 6 p.m. Wednesday.
On Thursday, Hartford, picked to finish last in the preseason coaches poll, will play the winner of Wednesday’s first game at 11 a.m., and UMass Lowell will play the winner of the second game at 2:30 p.m.
Thursday’s 6 p.m. game will pit the winner of Wednesday’s 6 p.m. elimination game against the lower seeded loser of games four and five.
There will be three more games on Friday at the same times and Saturday’s championship round begins at 1 p.m. with the if-necessary game to follow.
Binghamton (9-15, 18-30-1), which won the regular season title a year ago and was the unanimous preseason favorite to defend its title, finished last and failed to qualify.
“I’m not terribly excited about having to play on the first day because if we had won some more games early on, we wouldn’t have had to,” said UMaine coach Nick Derba. “But it will be nice to be the first team on the field in front of the home crowd.”
Derba likes his team’s chances to win the tournament but said it is important to be victorious in the opener and that his team must play up to its potential.
“If we play our best, we can win it. We have to be clicking on all cylinders, pitching and hitting,” said Derba who pointed out that it’s an “awfully tough road” to come all the way back and win the tourney if you lose your first game on the opening day of the tournament.
UMaine lost its first-day opener last season before winning four in a row to reach the championship round where UMBC beat the Black Bears 2-1 in 10 innings for the title.
UMaine junior right fielder Colin Ridley said he and his teammates are confident.
“We have to do the simple things … throw strikes, hit with men on base and get on base,” said Ridley.
Derba said he doesn’t expect to have starting second baseman Caleb Kerbs available due to a family issue. Kerbs returned to Brooklyn to attend to the matter and missed the Hartford series.
In Saturday’s finale at Mahaney Diamond, first-inning sacrifice flies by Danny Casals and Jonathan Bennett staked UMaine to a 2-0 lead and UMaine broke a 2-2 tie with a four-run rally in the third featuring Hernen Sardinas’ RBI double and Brandon Vicens’ opposite-field two-run homer to right.
But Ashton Bardzell’s three-run homer in the fifth triggered a string of 10 unanswered runs and chased UMaine starter Trevor DeLaite.
The Hawks reached relievers Connor Johnson, Zach Winn and Jonah Normandeau for seven more runs with Zach Ardito’s two-run single highlighting a three-run rally in the sixth and T.J. Ward’s two-run base hit keying a four-run rally in the eighth.
Drew DeMartino had a double and two singles for Hartford, and Ward had a solo homer to go with his two-run single. Nick Campana doubled and singled and knocked in a pair of runs. Seth Pinkerton picked up the win in relief with three innings of three-hit, shutout ball. He struck out four.
Chris Bec had four singles for the Black Bears. Vicens had a single to go with his homer, and Sardinas had a single to accompany his double.
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