Two weeks ago the Husson University baseball team was in fourth place in the five-team North Atlantic Conference East Division through no fault of its own — the Eagles had played just two games against league opponents.
Six NAC doubleheaders during an 11-day span remedied that.
Coach Chris Morris’ club closed out its regular season by sweeping all 12 contests, elevating the defending NAC champions to the top seed for the conference’s double-elimination tournament that begins Sunday at Cobleskill, New York.
Husson enters the event at 21-15 overall, 13-1 in league play after surging ahead of the NAC pack during the final two weeks of the regular season.
The East Division leaders are followed by West top seed SUNY Cobleskill (20-18, 11-4 NAC), East runner-up Thomas College of Waterville (15-23, 8-8) and West runner-up SUNY Canton (10-29, 7-8).
The East and West divisions rotate hosting the NAC championships each year, with Husson winning the 2021 tournament at the Winkin Complex in Bangor by defeating SUNY-Cobleskill 14-6 in the winner-take-all final game of their best-of-three championship series.
This year’s first three tournament games are Sunday, beginning at 10 a.m. when Husson plays SUNY Canton, followed at 1 p.m. when Cobleskill plays Thomas and concluding with a 4 p.m. elimination game between the losers of the first two contests.
The tourney continues at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Monday, with the championship game set for 11 a.m. Tuesday and a second game to follow if necessary to determine the winner of the NAC’s automatic bid to the NCAA Division III Tournament.
Husson began the bulk of its NAC schedule at 9-15 after a rigorous non-conference schedule.
It began with games against six regionally ranked NCAA Division III opponents during the Eagles’ season-opening trip to Florida, followed by testing encounters against New England powers Rhode Island College (23-7-1), Endicott (32-5) and Mitchell College (25-10) as well as in-state rivals Southern Maine (16-16), Saint Joseph’s (28-11) and Colby College (20-11) when the nonconference schedule came north.
“I think when you look at a lot of great teams in the region, they always play great competition,” Morris said. “Your record might not look the right way, but with those games you get to the point of the season when you want to be playing your best baseball and I think we certainly are doing that right now.”
One example of that comes at the plate, where Husson improved its team batting average from .237 to .296 between April 21 and May 1, during which the Eagles swept two doubleheaders each from NAC East rivals Thomas, UMaine-Presque Isle and UMaine-Farmington.
Top hitters include senior catcher Tyler Parke of Bangor (.379, two home runs and 22 runs batted in), first-year third baseman Tanner Evans of Greenbush and Old Town High School (.340, 34 RBI), senior shortstop Kobe Rogerson of Brewer (.339, 10 doubles, 14 stolen bases), junior outfielder Joshua Scott (.307, 7 HR, 34 RBI) and sophomore first baseman Jackson Curtis of Ellsworth (.291, 6 HR, 31 RBI), the 2021 NAC tournament MVP.
“I think we’ve seen almost every great arm in New England by now,” Morris said.
“There’s obviously some guys we’ve missed, but between Rhode Island College and Endicott you’re looking at two of the top five teams in New England, and then you sprinkle in Southern Maine and Mitchell and Colby, who should be ranked in the region, and when you play those teams you see such good arms that it just becomes another day and you don’t get surprised by velocity or spin. That’s really helped our hitters, that we’ve been able to see everything. When that happens the game starts to slow down and it’s definitely what’s happening for us right now.”
Senior left-hander Cam Graham of Littleton and Houlton High School anchors the pitching staff with a 4-3 record in 10 starts, and he’ll start Husson’s tournament opener against SUNY Canton.
“Cam Graham has been our ace since I got here,” said Morris, now in his third year with the Eagles. “In any game we’ve needed him to pitch and any game we’ve needed outs in, Cam has gotten the ball and I’m not going to change that until he’s no longer in uniform.”
