Baseball sweeps Hamilton; cruises to 11-8

Author: James Edward Kerrigan

The Panther's suffered their fourth straight loss on Wednesday against Massachusetts College, but rebounded with a three game sweep of divisional opponent Hamilton.

Mass. College took a commanding 6-0 lead after the first inning and never looked back. Mass. College took advantage of Middlebury's mistakes; they scored all six runs without collecting an extra base hit. Mass. College hit into a double play to stop the bleeding. John Lanahan '08 and Andrew Pavoni '06 both homered for the Panthers, but these two swings were overshadowed by Middlebury's seven errors in the field. After this defensive let down, the team fell below .500 for the season at 7-8.

Four straight losses in the heart of the season may have broken most teams, but once again the Panthers showed their resiliency and character by taking all three home games against NESCAC opponent Hamilton. Previous losses certainly added pressure to perform well against Hamilton.

Senior outfielder Dev Talvadkar who thrived under this pressure, collecting five RBIs, noted, "Of course we felt added pressure to win after last week because anytime your league schedule consists of 12 games and you lose three in a row there is added pressure to win." But Head Coach Bob Smith preaches approaching one game at a time. "We also played to put the pressure on Hamilton and not ourselves," he said. Expectations and pressures were high, but the men came through in impressive fashion.

Game one on Friday went back and forth in the early innings. Hamilton scored six times in the top of the fourth inning to open up the game. Middlebury fought back though. The squad managed two runs in the bottom half of the fourth inning to pull within three runs at 7-4.

First-year Jack Britton came on and pitched a remarkable 5.2 innings in relief. He took care of holding Hamilton. The bats also did their part as the attack put up five in the seventh and two more in the eighth. The men at the top of the lineup heated up as batters one through four each had multiple hit games. David Riester '05 led the way with four hits and three runs scored. But Dom DiDomenico '06 and Pavoni both had multi hit games; the two combined for three crucial runs.

Smith recognized some difference between the series against Amherst and this past weekend. "Pitching and defense for Hamilton was not as good [as Amherst]. We were efficient and hit well."

These differences were most visible on Saturday, especially during the first game. Middlebury picked up where it left off on Friday and jumped out to an 18-0 lead after just four innings. Between the end of Friday's game and the beginning of Saturday's game, the Panther offense scored two or more runs for six straight innings; they averaged 4.16 runs per inning over this stretch.

The pitching was equally strong; the staff gave up only three runs over two games. Riester earned the win in game one and lowered his season ERA to 1.93. Senior classmate Russ Budnick struck out eight and picked up the win in game two. Hamilton did, however, manage to beat Middlebury in total errors 9-2. These proved costly for Hamilton. Talvadkar noted the importance of errors, saying, "This weekend we made fewer mistakes and came through in the clutch." When it was all said and done, Middlebury won game one 19-1 and game two 10-2.

Next weekend, the Panthers square off for their final divisional series against Wesleyan. They stand at 5-4, one game behind of Williams in the NESCAC west region. But the important part is that Middlebury takes care of its own business.

"We have to show up to play like we did [last] Friday and Saturday. If we win all three we are set. If we do not we may have to rely on fate, so we can control our destiny," Coach Smith commented.

Talvadkar affirmed that, "If we play our game and limit mistakes we expect to take the series from Weslyean and hopefully if all goes as planned make the playoffs." Middlebury open on Friday at 4:00 p.m. and then come back at 12:00 p.m. on Saturday for a doubleheader.