The UMBC Retrievers baseball team came into the game smoking hot, winners of their last seven games. On Wednesday, they faced a tough midweek matchup at home against Navy (22-9, 9-2 conference) who had their own win streak of five games and were winners of 20 of their last 23 games. UMBC would look for revenge against the Midshipmen after their 13-4 loss earlier this season in Annapolis.
UMBC would start down 1-0 after the top of the first inning but would quickly strike back on a Terrance Pinkston leadoff homer. Blaze O’Saben and Christian Torres would follow with runs via a wild pitch and an RBI double by AJ Wright. Navy would answer right back with a two-run homer by Navy’s Matt Wolff in the second to tie the game at 3. In the third, Pinkston would add another RBI to his sheet on a deep sacrifice fly to left field to score Ryan Brown to take the lead back at 4-3.
In the fourth inning, UMBC would explode with four runs on a 2-out rally. With the bases loaded, Joe Milkowski cleared the bases with a double. Andres Machado followed suit as he popped a blooper into right field to score Milkowski to take the lead 8-3. Through four innings, UMBC had left 9 men on base.
Pitchers from both dugouts settled in after the first 4 innings. After Tanner Esposito pitched the first inning and Reid Celata pitched the second inning, Greg Albert came on with a great relief outing of 3 IP, 1 H, 0 ER and 3 K’s. Albert lowered his season ERA from 8.44 to 6.59 on the evening.
In the sixth inning, Machado dropped another RBI single to score Brown for his third run of the day to extend the UMBC lead to 9-3.
Max Goron, Aaron Husson and Bryan Gilliam all saw action after Albert’s strong three innings and did not allow any runs. After the team allowed 5 hits in the first 2 innings, UMBC pitchers quieted the Navy bats as they only allowed 2 hits the remainder of the game. UMBC finished the game totaling 9 runs on 12 hits, with a clean defensive game for their second consecutive game.
UMBC saw action from their entire lineup, as every starter reached base. The dynamic trio of Terrance Pinkston, Blaze O’Saben and Christian Torres went a combined 5 for 12 for the evening, each gathering one run. Terrance Pinkston, Blaze O’Saben and Christian Torres all continue their unbelievable seasons, hitting .391, .292 and .370 respectively.
Ryan Brown saw the ball at the plate very well, going 2 for 2 with 2 walks and collecting 3 runs.
UMBC extends their win streak to 8 games, their longest win streak since the 2016 season. Their win against Navy propels them to an overall 13-11 record (1-5 conference). UMBC will look to extend their win streak and improve on their conference record as they head back on the road this weekend as they take on conference foe Maine for a 3-game series starting this Saturday. The Maine Black Bears currently sit at 2-21, and 1-4 in conference. UMBC will return to Alumni Field next Tuesday as they take on the 16-12 George Washington Colonials at 6 p.m.
