Yesterday, the Boston College baseball team crossed over the river into Cambridge to face Harvard in the first round of the Baseball Beanpot. While the Eagles leapt out to an early lead, their offense stalled and the defense couldn’t hold onto the lead, as BC eventually fell by a final score of 6-5.
In the top of the first, John Hennessy, Blake Butera, and Chris Shaw quickly loaded the bases, Hennessy walking, while Butera and Shaw hit singles. In the next at-bat, Joe Cronin doubled down the right field line to bat in both Hennessy and Butera, giving the Eagles a 2-0 lead. Cronin and Shaw would also score, BC going up 4-0 before the end of the first inning.
This would be the end of the offense for the Eagles until the ninth inning, though.
The next inning and a half went hitless for both teams with Eric Stevens on the mound for BC, but then, in the bottom of the third, Harvard managed to put up the first bit of a response to BC’s early offense when, after the Eagles committed an error allowing runners to enter scoring position, the Crimson put its first mark on the board, making it 4-1.
While the Eagles’ hitting struggled, the Crimson managed to chip away at the BC lead, scoring one in the fourth and one in the sixth, then having a prolific inning of its own in the bottom of the eighth, as the team scored three runs to bring the score to 6-4-finally gaining its first lead and effectively putting the Eagles away as they failed to put up enough of a response in the top of the ninth.
The one hit that the Crimson had in the fourth would be the only that Stevens allowed in his four-inning performance before being relieved by Bobby Skogsbergh, who pitched the next two, allowing two hits.
In the bottom of the seventh, Tyler Hinchliffe took over on the mound, but in his one-and-one-third innings pitched, he allowed two hits and two runs, earning himself the loss.
BC fought back to within one off of Shaw’s second RBI of the day, but the Crimson eventually managed to end the game while still grasping onto the one-run lead.
With the loss in the first round of the tournament, the Eagles will face Northeastern in next week’s game for third place. The Huskies lost to UMass yesterday by a score of 5-3, and the Minutemen and the Crimson will meet in the final.
