Baltimore, MD ? The University of Hartford baseball team dropped a doubleheader to the UMBC Retrievers, which opened a four-game series against the Retrievers on Saturday evening. The Hawks lost 10-3 in the first game and 7-4 in the second game. With Saturday's losses, the Hawks fall to 9-23 overall and 1-7 in America East play.
Ben Sobocinski Suffered the loss in the first game, a seven inning game. He pitched the first 5.1 innings and allowed all 10 runs, eight earned, on 12 hits. He also walked three batters and struck out only one. Rookie, Andrew Smith closed out the game, pitching the final two-thirds innings. He did not allow a hit, but walked and struck out two batters.
At the plate, the Hawks were led by Andrew Siano, who finished 2-for-3 with two RBI. Matt Walker and Rodger Wilmot also hit well, going 3-for-3 and 2-for-3 respectively. Walker and Wilmot also scored twice for Hartford. The two were the first two runs to score for the Hawks in the fifth inning. Each was knocked in on sacrifice flies from Cory Beahm and Siano.
The Hawks other three runs came in the seventh inning, after battling from behind the entire game. Hartford gave up eight runs over a span of three innings, three in the second and third and two in the fourth, while the final two came in the sixth. The Hawks three runs in the seventh were all made possible by three-straight hits from Walker, Wilmot and Beahm. Walker became the first run, scoring on an error in right field. Wilmot scored on a sacrifice fly for the second time in the game and Beahm was knocked in on a single from Siano.
In the night cap, Weston Szymanski suffered his fifth loss (0-5) of the season. He pitched the first 6.1 innings and allowed all seven runs scored in the game. He gave up 11 total hits, while walking two and striking out three. Steve Sobocinski came out of the pen and closed the game for Hartford. He did not allow a run on two hits in 1.2 innings of work. He also struck out three batters and didn't concede a walk.
Hartford would again battle from behind, this time right from the start, giving up four runs in the first inning. One more run was added in the third and the final two Retriever runs came in the seventh. Hartford did score first in the game, putting a single run on the board in the first inning. They didn't score again until the sixth, scoring two runs, and then added a single run in the seventh.
All nine Hawk positional players added at least one hit as Andy Drexel and Drew Sgro were the only two to finished with two hits each. Drexel finished the game 2-for-3 with an RBI, while Sgro was 2-for-4 with an RBI. Two other players added a single RBI for Hartford.
Drexel knocked in the first Hartford run scoring Brady Stouffer, who singled to reach base, on a sacrifice fly. Having already relinquished the lead, Hartford battled for two runs in the sixth began with back-to-back hits to start the inning, a double from Drexel and an RBI single from Ben Sobocinski. Sgro then knocked in the final run of the inning on an infield groundout.
Hartford's final run came by way of an error, which allowed Simon Kudernatsch to reach base and advance to second. He then scored on the next at bat, a single to left from Mike Amendola.
The Hawks and Retrievers will play a second double header on Sunday, beginning at 1:00 p.m., to close out the four game series.
