The Massachusetts baseball team suffered a midweek defeat at the hands of the Harvard Crimson 10-3 on Tuesday in the Baseball Beanpot consolation game. Harvard (6-19, 3-6 Ivy League) started out hot and kept its foot on the petal en route to victory.
The Minutemen (9-18, 2-4 Atlantic 10) started Andrew Middleton on the mound, who accrued a steady, scoreless first three innings keeping the Crimson offense quiet. However, the second time through the order was Harvard’s time to heat up, as it put up two runs on two hits while walking three times as Middleton came out after getting just one out in the inning.
Jacob Terwilliger relieved him but he couldn’t stop the Crimson offense either as he allowed two runs with no help from his defense as a throwing error scored one of them putting Harvard up 4-0 after four.
In the fifth inning, UMass threw a punch back in the form of a Marc Willi two-run home run. The home run was the redshirt freshman’s first of his career. Willi drove in the only other run of the game with an RBI single in the ninth scoring Matt Travisano. He finished the day 2-4 with three RBI and one strikeout.
Harvard scored two more runs in the sixth to increase the lead to 6-2 with an RBI single and a score on an error, one of UMass’ three on the day. An RBI double in the eighth, an RBI walk and an RBI hit by pitch in the ninth extended Harvard’s lead to 10-2 before the aforementioned Willi RBI single in the ninth left the final score at 10-3.
The Minutemen pitching on the day allowed 12 hits, seven walks and one HBP in their nine innings of work. Harvard pitching allowed just six hits and three walks with 12 strikeouts. Every Crimson hitter with a hit recorded multiple. Jordan Kang led the way with a final stat line of 4-5 with three runs and an RBI.
The Minutemen are just over halfway through the year. Team leaders from the offensive side of the field include Matt Travisano who leads the team in batting average, runs, hits and on base percentage. His .346 batting average is 12th in the conference.
Mike Gervasi is tied for the conference lead with eight homers. Defensively, Ryan Kolben and Kyle Hoog both sport a perfect fielding percentage with over 10 putouts each. On the mound, Leif Bigelow has a 2.95 ERA in 18.1 innings pitched leading the team. Robbie O’Connor leads the team with 23 strikeouts in 33 innings pitched.
UMass has a quick turnaround with another midweek matchup with the Fairfield Stags in Connecticut on Wednesday, April 10, with first pitch set for 2:30 p.m.
Owen Shelffo can be reached at [email protected] and followed on Twitter @owen_shelffo
