Ferrara's walk off hit lifts MCLA Baseball to series win over Mass. Maritime
North Adams, MA- Jake Ferrara's single to center field scored Austin Rachiele with the winning run and completing a comeback win and lifting the Trailblazers to a 4-3 nine inning win over Mass. Maritime in game two of a twinbill at Joe Wolfe Field in MASCAC action. The Buccaneers took game one 2-1 in a pitchers duel.
MCLA (8-17) takes the season series from MMA and is now 2-8 in the conference. MMA (7-18) drops to 4-8 in the league.
Game one: Mass. Maritime 2 - MCLA 1
The opening game saw both starting pitchers throw very well. MMA's Brian Kwedor and MCLA's Brendan Kelly matched each other pitch for pitch and kept opposing offenses at bay.
MCLA actually led 1-0 after two innings of play as Ferrara scored on a miscue from the Bucs.
The visitors took the lead when they got to Kelly for two runs in the third inning. Marley Dembitzki drove home Paul Sances with a double to tie things up at 1-1. He would come around on Jackson Simone's RBI knock to left field.
From there, Kwedor did the rest. The right hander allowed just two hits and struck out a pair of Trailblazers. He was very efficient as he needed just 77 pitches to record the win as he improved to 2-5 on the season.
MMA's offense outhit the Trailblazers 6-2 in the opener.
Kelly put together his best start of the season going the distance and allowing the two earned runs with five strikeouts.
Game Two: MCLA 4 - MMA 3
Click Image to view Jake Ferrara's walk off single
The Trailblazers found themselves trailing for most of game two. MMA jumped out to a 2-0 lead after three innings of play before MCLA started chipping away at the lead.
In the fourth, they got a run back as Logan Rumbolt scored on a wild pitch from MMA starter John Teehan. The score would remain that way until the sixth inning when the visitors added another run on an A.J. Luciano single to increase the lead to 3-1, but MCLA wouldn't go away.
In the bottom of the sixth, Ben Durland singled home Ferrara to cut the deficit to 3-2. After reliever Bobby New held MMA off the board in the seventh, the Trailblazers found the equalizer.
Christian Seariac's sac fly brought home pinch runner Shawn James with the tying run and the game headed to extra innings.
Each team went quietly in the eighth inning, but MCLA finally scored the game winner in the ninth. With one out, Rachiele singled to left field. After another out, he would steal second base. Seariac would walk which brought Ferrara to the plate. He would deliver a solid single into center field and Rachiele came racing home with the game winning run.
The walk off made a winner out of New. The win is his second in three days against MMA as he shut them out on Friday. He went three innings and struck out three batters to improve to 4-3 on the season. Mike Urbanski started and tossed six quality innings.
Logan Rumbolt went 4-5 in the nightcap to lead the offense while Ferrara ended with two hits.
MCLA is back in action on Tuesday when they host Fitchburg State.