BC Guy saves Spirit from more Sussex embarassment

...McGuire is a solid pickup, y'all. He was SICK in the Big East hitting over .400 his sophomore season, and tore it up in the Cape League too. He struggled in the ACC this year but I think he'll be fine at this level. He has decent speed and fielding ability.

---from northshorespirit.com---:

Mike Torres singled home Jared McGuire in the bottom of the tenth inning as the Spirit leave the Skyhawks on the field with a 4-3 walkoff win Saturday night at Fraser Field.

It was BC graduate Jared McGuire’s first game with the Spirit and he came through in a big way by singling and stealing second base to set-up the opposite field hit by Torres to give the Spirit the victory.

The Skyhawks struck first in the contest in the top of the fifth inning on a two-run home run by Steve Friend that plated Matt Ceriani to make the score 2-0. The home run was Friend’s second in as many games versus the Spirit and two total on the season.

Sussex tacked on another run the following inning on consecutive doubles to lead off the frame by Rob Gandolfo and Jabe Bergeron, upping the score to 3-0.

The Spirit closed in on the Skyhawks in the sixth. Gary Roche blooped a single to center and moved to third on a double by Mike Torres. Cleanup hitter Luis Lopez ripped a single to left and collected his first two RBIs in a Spirit uniform by plating Roche and Torres to cut the lead 3-2.

The Spirit evened the score in the seventh on a sacrifice fly by BJ Weed that scored Jerson Perez from third on a close play at the plate which Skyhawks backstop Ceriani dropped the ball and just like that the score was tied at three a piece.

The Skyhawks squandered a great chance to take the lead in the top of the tenth inning. With the bases loaded and one out, Spirit closer Derek Drage struck out Larry Bethea and Scott Grimes to get out of the jam.

Drage would pick up the win in relief, his second of the season, striking out five hitters in his two innings of work, including the two Ks that ended the threat in the tenth.

Torres continued his torrid hitting pace this season, going 2-for-4 in the ballgame while picking up his 30 RBI of the season on the walkoff single off Sussex hurler Bart Braun.

The Spirit look to take the series lead tomorrow afternoon with the first pitch slated for 1:05. Matthew Bishop will oppose Rene Barreras in game three of the series.

BC advances to Baseball Beanpot final

BC 5, Harvard 2 : Baseball Beanpot First Round @ Fraser Field

HU 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 -- 2
BC 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 2 X -- 5

W) Ted Ratliffe
L) Ryan Watson

Baseball returned to Fraser Field on Thursday afternoon as the Boston College Eagles handled the Harvard Crimson 5-2. They will look to defend their Beanpot crown against Northeastern University next Wednesday at Fenway Park. A three run second inning was all BC would need, as Ted Ratliffe was on cruise control, pitching a complete game en route to the victory.

BC's pitcher Ted Ratliffe tossed a complete game to score the victory

Harvard scored first in the top of the 2nd. A leadoff single by Andrew Price and a 1-out double by Andrew Casey set up Dan Zailskas's sacrifice fly to center field to give the Crimson a 1-0 lead.

The Eagles responded immediately with their big outburst. Eric Campbell led off the inning with a walk and a steal of 2nd base. Jared McGuire brought him home with an RBI single to center to tie the ballgame.

With McGuire on 3rd and one out, Joseph Ayers executed the squeeze play to bring home the Eagles' second run. In addition, Ayers beat out the throw to first, setting up a situation of runners on the corners and only one out for Robert Anston, who grounded out 6-3 but drove in the third run of the inning.

Joseph Ayers' squeeze bunt gave the Eagles the 2-1 lead.

Harvard closed back within one in the third on Price's RBI single, but that was the last run they'd get off Ratliffe, who dominated the rest of the way.

Mike Augustine and Jared McGuire drove in insurance runs for BC in the bottom of the 8th, setting up the 5-2 final score. Ratliffe struck out pinch hitter Justin Roth to end the ballgame.

Earlier in the day, Northeastern destroyed UMass 18-6 at Northeastern to win their semifinal.

Fans anticipating the showdown between BU and Berklee College of Music in the CrapPot.

Kudos to Dave Riley for putting together this nice video of the festivities at Fraser:

Jenna Macchi

The sports editor for The Heights, BC's student newspaper, wanted someone to do a feature article on Jenna Macchi - BC's best softball player, and sister of former Spirit star Brian Macchi. I jumped at the chance and will be interviewing her today. I'll be sure to ask what Big Mac is up to. He was always one of my favorite Spirit players.

The article will run on Monday - I'll post it here when it's up.

It's been a pretty crappy year for the BC softball team so far (1-8 if I remember correctly, and they haven't even gotten into the heart of the ACC schedule yet) but evidently Ms. Macchi is pretty good. I've never seen them play, but I'll probably make it to a few home games once they start playing up north. More than likely I will also cover a few of the games for The Heights.

Our baseball team is doing surprisingly well by their standards, 4-2 right now in the ACC including a win over a tough Georgia Tech team and a sweep of Duke. In non conference play they were an inning away from beating #1 Vanderbilt when the closer blew his 4th save in 5 opportunities - finally leading to him being replaced. Since then, the Eagles [6-8-1 overall] have improved. They'll need to really step it up this weekend - they have a big three-game ACC series @ #2 Florida State before having their home opening series against NC State, Mar. 30-Apr 2.

I do not want to be BC-centric so I will also give a little update on some other local teams:
Harvard Baseball: 2-2, first home game April 4th vs. HC
NU Baseball: 5-5, first home game Mar. 27 vs. Rhode Island
UMass Baseball: 2-5, first home game Mar. 27 vs. mighty Sacred Heart

I'm looking forward to the Baseball Beanpot. I'll probably be a little bit late, but I'll definitely try to come.

3rd day of spring games..

It's the 6th inning in Ft. Myers and the Red Sox trail the 'Jays, 6-4. The important stuff: In Manny's first appearance he went 0-1 with a walk before being lifted for a pinch runner in the 3rd, Runelvys Hernandez gave up every single run (all of them earned) in an atrocious 3rd inning, allowing 6 hits. Snyder pitched two shutout innings, Donnelly pitched another shutout inning, and Okajima, in his first action, pitched a perfect inning.

Did I mention the other night that I LOVE Brendan Donnelly? And as for RunElvis -- IDK what the Sox were thinking with that signing - I hope he continues to get lit up in Grapefruit action so we let him go before the real season starts.

BC vs. Dice-K tonight is the main event on NESN. I'll be in Durham, NH watching the BC men's hockey team take on UNH (look for me on NESN starting at 7:30) but I'll probably be listening on the radio at some point. GO EAGLES! Don't beat up Dice-K too badly, now, y'hear - he's kind of important :)

I'll be in New Hampshire all weekend, but if I get internet access (doubtful - I hear the state of New Hampshire has 3 computers and Spike has exclusive access to 1 of them) I'll blog about BC's victory over the Red Sox.

Ta ta and happy spring! (Even if it doesn't feel like it w/ the sideways freezing rain)

Baseball's Back!

In a mere 32 hours or so, the Boston Red Sox (or a reasonable facsimile thereof) will take the field against the Minnesota Twins in the first Grapefruit League game of the season. How sweet is that? Even if you hate spring training baseball and don't like to watch it, it's just a good feeling knowing that the team will be playing games again.

I tend to get very into the spring games for the first week and a half, before getting bored with it then jumping back in maybe 3 days before the regular season. It'll just be really nice to be able to listen to the Sox on the radio while doing homework, check box scores in the morning, and do all of those other cool baseball things.

I'm pretty pumped that Daisuke Matsuzaka's first appearance will come against the Boston College Eagles in the annual exhibition between the two teams. C'mon BC - do you believe in miracles? ;)

On a related note, College baseball's been underway for over a week now. BC started the year 0-3 with 3 ludicrously heartbreaking one run losses against three very good southern teams. On Sunday, they led #1 Vanderbilt 6-5 in the 9th with 2 outs and nobody on before the closer walked a man then gave up a walkoff two run blast for his 2nd blown save of the young season. It would have been a monumental win for the Eagles, probably one of the biggest in program history.

Even though they're not expected to do that well in the tough ACC, I'm looking forward to checking out a number of games at Shea Field since 1) it's baseball and 2) it's free. I encourage any of you to come join me for some BC baseball games. ACC baseball is superb.

There are some Spirit connections, too: ex-Spirit Joe Hastings is the assistant coach of the baseball team. I'll also be going to a few softball games - Jenna Macchi, Brian's sister, is one of the better players on the lady Eagles softball team, and Brian apparently serves as an assistant coach / advisor.

Should be a fun spring/summer/fall. Play ball!