Adding insult to injury, Bowdoin suffered a 19-9 blowout loss to Husson on Wednesday after an already disappointing weekend against Tufts.
After trading runs for the majority of the game, Husson exploded for nine runs in the bottom of the eighth inning to secure the victory. A usually strong bullpen struggled in the contest as Bowdoin needed to use nine pitchers on the day. It was the team's first loss in a mid-week game, but it will not have any impact on the team's playoff hopes.
Just four days earlier, Bowdoin walked off the field having won the last of a three-game set against Tufts. Unfortunately, the Bears had already lost the previous two games and now take a 3-4 NESCAC record into their last series of the regular season.
The team needed to take two out of three off of the Jumbos in order to stay in control of their playoff hopes, but made it difficult after losing the first game of the series 15-3.
All aspects of the team fell flat as Tufts easily took the victory in the first game of the series. The hitting struggled with just seven hits on the day while defensively, four errors led to four unearned runs. The only high points for the Bears were three solo home runs by Dan Hicks '11, Kevin Zikaras '10, and Joe Berte '09.
"Hicks has become a real presence in our lineup, his hitting has really improved this year," said Coach Michael Connolly.
But with the loss on Friday, Bowdoin looked to sweep the double header the following day. In the first of two, Bowdoin was down 11-3 going into the bottom of the seventh after having let up six runs in the fifth. The team knew how important the game was and began to rally. But even after putting together six runs in the top half of the seventh, the team fell just short and lost 11-9 after an almost brilliant comeback.
Having lost the first two games of the series, Bowdoin needed to win the last game in order to put pressure on Tufts to relinquish that last playoff spot. On the shoulders of captain Jason Koperniak '09 and sophomore Brendan Garner, the Bears were able to muster a win against Tufts, taking the game 13-7.
Joe Pace '10 was the winning pitcher in the contest, going five strong innings, giving up just four hits and three earned runs. Offensively, Koperniak provided most of the support with four RBIs in the game while Garner added three of his own. Tim Welch '12 recorded the save in the game after pitching four innings and allowing only two earned runs.
Defensively, the team struggled all weekend long. The Bears had 14 errors over the three-game span that led to seven unearned runs in total.
Going into this weekend's series against Bates, the team has the exact same playoff picture as it did last year. Bowdoin needs to sweep the Bobcats and have Tufts lose at least one game against Colby.
Last year, Colby did indeed take a game from Tufts, but the Bears dropped a game to the Bobcats, ruining their playoff chances. Bates comes into this weekend with a 2-6 record in the NESCAC, and is 8-16 overall. Bowdoin, now 17-15 on the season, look to take game one of the series at Bates today at 3 p.m.