Hartford, Conn. – The Trinity College Bantams fell behind, 8-1, and fell a run short despite a six-run rally in the sixth inning, falling, 8-7, to the visiting Bates College Bobcats in New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC) East Division baseball action this afternoon at Murren Family Field in DiBenedetto Stadium.  Trinity falls to 13-11 overall and 7-3 in the NESCAC with its first loss in five games.  Bates improves to 11-12 overall and 4-3 in the division.  The teams will finish the three-game series in Hartford tomorrow with a doubleheader at noon.

Trinity trailed by seven runs heading into the bottom of the sixth frame, but opened the frame with four hits in a row on its way to cutting the deficit to one.  Senior 2B Cooper Mooney (Southbury, Conn.) led off with a high fly ball down the right field line that landed just fair and took a high bounce off the turf that allowed him to make second base.  Classmate Brendan Pierce (Hingham, Mass.) followed with a double to left field to score Mooney, and senior Matt Toth (New Canaan, Conn.) delivered with a pinch-hit, RBI single to right field to cut the Bobcat lead to 8-3.  Trinity scored another run later in the inning on a bases-loaded, ground ball by senior captain Christian Orsini (Livingston, N.J.), while junior 1B John Stamatis (Ridgefield, Conn.) smacked a two-run triple to right-center field and scored the seventh Bantam run on a sacrifice fly by sophomore SS Matt Koperniak (Adams, Mass.). 

Five relievers shut down the offenses over the game's final three innings, however, including Bates senior co-captain Jake Shapiro (Sandy, Utah) who retired the last five Bantams to collect his fourth save of the season.  Rookie C Eric Thronson (McLean, Va.) singled in the seventh frame, but was the lone Bantam baserunner after the sixth.  Sophomores Alex Herbst (Clarendon Hill, Ill.) and Andrew Deroche (North Reading, Mass.) and senior McLane Hill (Marlborough, Conn.) combined for 3.2 innings of hitless relief for Trinity.  Shapiro and junior Alex Simon (Windsor, Conn.) allowed just one hit in 3.2 innings of relief work for the Bobcats.  Bates senior starter Connor Russell (Cumberland, Maine) improved to 3-1 despite allowing nine hits and seven runs with four walks in 5.1 innings.  Junior LHP Erik Mohl (Milton, Mass.) took the loss for the Bantams, falling to 2-4.

Bates had taken a 1-0 lead in the second inning on an RBI single by sophomore Giovanni Torres (North Haven, Conn.), and Trinity tied it in the third when Stamatis led off with a single and scored on a ground ball by Mooney.  The Bobcats score five times in the fifth inning on five singles and a throwing error by Mohl, and twice more in the sixth to make it 8-1 thanks to an RBI double by sophomore C Jack Arend (Newfields, N.H.) and a run-scoring single by sophomore Zach Avila (San Francisco, Calif.).  Stamatis finished 2-for-5 at the plate with two runs and two RBI, while junior 3B Ben Reinisch (Troy, N.Y.) and sophomore Mack Lauder (Chappaqua, N.Y.) also had two hits for Trinity.  Arend and Torres were both 2-for-4 for Bates.