MANSFIELD, Conn. – Senior Preston [Irby] Cosme-Cruz (Bridgeport) drove in seven runs and junior J.T. Clark (Bristol) six in their team's 29-hit attack as the Eastern Connecticut State University baseball team secured the No. 3 seed in next week's Little East Conference tournament with a 15-2 (seven innings), 11-6 conference doubleheader sweep of the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Friday afternoon at the Eastern Baseball Stadium.
After sweeping 2024 LEC tournament champion UMass Dartmouth (16-18, 8-8 LEC) in the regular season for the fifth straight year, Eastern (27-11, 12-4 LEC) faces No. 4 seed University of Southern Maine (20-17, 11-5 LEC) in the first round of the six-team, double-elimination tournament Wednesday at 2 p.m. at the Owl Athletic Complex on the campus of top-seeded Keene State College.
A win over Southern Maine would advance Eastern to play Thursday at 2 p.m. against the winner of Wednesday's first-round game between No. 2 seed University of Massachusetts Boston and No. 5 seed Rhode Island College. A Wednesday loss would drop the Warriors into an elimination game Thursday against the winner of Wednesday's first-round game between No. 1 Keene and No. 6 UMass Dartmouth.
Keene State won its first outright regular-season title this year since 2008, when it hosted and won the tournament by beating Southern Maine in the championship game that year. Eastern is an 11-time LEC tournament champion, winning most recently in 2022 and 2023.
Long-time LEC tournament rivals Eastern and Southern Maine split this year's LEC regular-season doubleheader at the Eastern Baseball Stadium, trading 3-2 decisions.
Eastern, which closed out its home season with an 11-2 record Friday, collected double-digit hits for the fourth straight game and for the ninth time in its last 12 games. Cosme-Cruz and Clark were both 5-of-8, with Cosme-Cruz doubling three times and Clark doubling and homering. Senior catcher Hank Penders (Wethersfield) was 5-of-6 with five runs scored and two RBI, while sophomore DH Ian Moser (Bellingham, MA) had three hits (two doubles), three RBI and three runs scored.
Senior leftfielder Alejandro Soriano (Hartford) ended the regular season having reached safely in all 38 games, giving him 40 in a row dating back to 2024. He reached five times on the day with two singles, two hit-by-pitch and a walk and scored the 100th run of his career.
Senior lefty Francis Ferguson (Holden, MA) pitched the first four innings of the opener to gain his fourth win in six decisions. He allowed only one hit and one run with five strikeouts and four walks.
In the nightcap, graduate righty Nathan Furino (East Haven) improved to 4-1 this year and 23-5 in his career with 2 2/3 innings of two-hit relief after taking over for senior righty starter Matthew Wootton (Milford). Wootton was lifted while the Corsairs were scoring three runs in the fifth to take a 6-1 lead, but the Warriors battled back with ten runs over their final four at-bats. Trailing 6-5, the Warriors pushed across four runs in the seventh to take their first lead on two hits, four walks, and error. Clark highlighted the inning with a two-run double that gave the Warriors the lead for good.