Despite dropping two games to Trinity over the weekend, the Middlebury College baseball team will be heading to the postseason for the first time since 2006, the same year that they won their first and only NESCAC championship. The Panthers’ playoff fate was out of their hands entering the weekend, as their games against the Bantams would not count towards their NESCAC west record, which determines a team’s playoff standing.
Instead, the Panthers had to wait on the results of the Amherst-Wesleyan series to see if they would be playing postseason baseball this spring. The Cardinals would have needed to sweep Amherst in order to keep Middlebury out of the playoffs, but they did not even come close, losing two out of three to the Lord Jeffs and in the process giving the Panthers their first playoff berth in five years.
“Everyone is pumped about the playoffs,” said Joe Conway ’13 of the Panthers’ bid. “Obviously that is every team’s goal, and we are very fortunate to have a shot to compete for the NCAA tournament.”
In the first game of their Saturday doubleheader at Trinity, the Panthers seemed primed to take a game from the home nine as they were able to jump out to a 6-0 lead after the first three innings. Zach Roeder ’12 homered in the first, Alex Kelly ’14 singled home a run in the second, and Thomas Rafferty ’13 and Tyler Wark ’12 both contributed RBIs in the third to stake Middlebury to the early lead.
However, the Bantams would cut the lead in half with three runs in the bottom of the fourth, and then exploded in the sixth for five runs off of Middlebury starter Michael Joseph ’13, who had given the Panthers a solid outing up to that point. Joseph was replaced by John Popkowski ’13 with two out in the sixth, and Popkowski allowed another Trinity run before he was able to retire the side. With the scoreboard suddenly against them, the Panthers were able to muster only one hit in the top of the seventh before falling by the eventual score of 9-6.
The second game of the doubleheader was never in doubt, as Trinity scored methodically throughout the middle innings of the contest en route to an 11-2 victory.
The Bantams chased Middlebury starter Nick Angstman ’11 after just three innings and handed him his first loss of the season, as the Panther ace had been undefeated up to that point. Middlebury’s only runs in the game came in their halves of the fifth and the sixth, thanks to a Wark sacrifice fly and a Roeder ground-out, respectively. The Panthers were able to manage only six hits in game two.
“There’s not a whole lot to say about Trinity,” said Conway. “They were good that day and we weren’t, and I think everybody is ready to move on from it and focus on what’s ahead.”
Middlebury will close out their regular season with NESCAC series against Bowdoin and first-place Tufts before heading to the conference playoffs at Amherst on May 14-15. If the Panthers are able to exhibit the level of focus they showed in their two dominating regular-season sweeps of Williams and Hamilton, they should be bound to be a tough out for any competition they might face in the NESCAC tournament. The Tufts series will be a barometer for how the Panthers will fare against top-level competition.
Baseball drops two to Trinity, heading to NESCAC playoffs
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