The Massachusetts baseball team dropped the consolation game of the Baseball Beanpot at home Tuesday afternoon, 18-11 to Northeastern. The Minutemen (4-20, 0-6 Atlantic 10) have lost eight straight games.
Despite making a push in the sixth inning, UMass couldn’t claw its way back from a 12-4 deficit. Heading into the bottom of the sixth inning, the Minutemen trailed by eight, but a string of singles from Michael Toth and Kyle Hoog, as well as hit by pitch on Zack Zaetta got them right back in it with the score at 12-10.
However, the Huskies (26-6, 8-4 Northeast Conference) didn’t allow the Minutemen momentum to carry into the seventh, where they put up four runs of their own to extend the lead to six.
A shutout bottom of the seventh from Northeastern pitcher Griffin Young killed any momentum UMass could’ve carried into the final innings.
The Huskies’ offense was on point all day, scoring at least one run in all but two innings and taking wind out of the Minutemen’s sails on multiple occasions.
“We were missing spots all day all around, getting behind hitters,” UMass coach Matt Reynolds said. “They’re a really good offensive team, Northeastern is. When we fall behind them and have to leave pitches in the middle of the plate or just miss pitches over the plate, they do a really good job. Their middle of the order absolutely killed us.”
UMass got off to a hot start at the plate, answering Northeastern’s two first inning runs with four of its own.
“We’ve come a long way offensively, we have,” Reynolds said. “There’s still more to go but, from where we were at the beginning of the year, it was really a problem for us at the beginning of the year. I feel like our at-bats have gotten a lot better and some guys are coming around, so yeah, it’s encouraging.”
Tuesday afternoon was a bullpen day for the Minutemen, a pattern for midweek games. Reynolds used six different arms in the game, with none going more than 2.1 innings.
Starter Cole Koeppel owned the most time on the mound, starting strong for the first two but losing some touch in the third. Koeppel finished giving up six runs on six hits, walking two batters.
Senior Daniel Livnat cleaned up the third inning mess, only allowing one additional run, but the rest of the bullpen arms struggled for the rest of the game.
The next two pitchers out of the bullpen were Blake Bennett and Ben Chrzanowski, who combined to give up nine runs on nine hits with three walks in 3.2 innings. These middle innings were ultimately what put the game out of reach for UMass later on.
“A lot of the times when you’re throwing a lot of bullpen arms and maybe some guys that are getting opportunities that don’t on the weekends, generally speaking that lends itself to more offense,” Reynolds said. “But we still have high expectations for their execution, that was more the problem today than our stuff or our [velocity]. We just didn’t execute our pitches very well.”
Sophomore Carter Hanson was the offensive leader Tuesday afternoon, going 2-4 at the plate with two RBIs and two runs scored. Hanson is now batting .305 and is one of the top offensive catalysts for the Minutemen this season.
“[Hanson has] taken huge strides as far as his approach and ability to lay off some off-speed pitches,” Reynolds said. “There’s more to come, there’s more in there. Hopefully he just keeps working and keeps getting better each day.”
The Minutemen take the field again this Friday when they welcome Richmond to Earl Lorden Field for a three-game series. First pitch is set for Friday, April 14 at 3 p.m.
Matt Skillings can be reached at [email protected] and followed on Twitter @matt_skillings.
