Box Score The Hamilton College baseball team opened its final NESCAC West Division series of the season Friday in Williamstown, Mass. The Continentals dropped a 6-4 decision to the Williams College Ephs.
Hamilton (14-13, 3-7 NESCAC West) brought the go-ahead run to the plate in the ninth inning before the Ephs (11-17, 5-5) shut down the rally to seal the win.
The ninth opened with a pinch-hit double by Cooper Halpern '19 (who's five for his last six as a pinch-hitter with three runs batted in). Two outs later Brett Mele '17 drew a walk to put the tying run on base but Williams' Tom Benz fanned Hamilton's clean-up hitter to end the game.
Hamilton left six runners on in the last four innings after the Ephs took the lead for good with a pair of fifth-inning runs.
The Continentals scored twice in the fourth to tie the score at 3-3. Andrew Haser '17 led off with a single and after an infield error allowed Chris Collins '17 to reach, Griffin Small '17 singled in Haser and Mike Chiseri '16 tied the game with a run-scoring groundout.
Mele drove in the day's first run, singling through the right side with one out in the top of the first to score Ryan Wolfsberg '17, who'd led off the game with a double.
Hamilton pulled to within 5-4 in the sixth after Haser's lead-off triple was followed by a one-out run-scoring single by David Rose '16.
Adam Regensburg put Williams ahead for good, drilling a one-out double down the left-field line to bring in David Rosas and Kellen Hatheway.
Jack Cloud, who had three of Williams' 10 hits, had a hand in each of the hosts' first three runs. In the bottom of the first he followed Doug Schaeffer's lead-off single with a triple and came around to score when the relay was mishandled. Two innings later he doubled and came in to score on a sacrifice fly by Hatheway.
Haser, Rose and Small each had two hits for Hamilton. Cole Dreyfuss '16 took the loss, despite striking out five Ephs in seven innings.
Luke Rodino earned the win, fanning nine in his seven innings of work. Benz allowed two hits to pick up the save.
The teams resume their series Saturday at noon with a doubleheader at Bobby Coombs Field.
