WINTHROP — Every tournament, in every sport, at every level has the red-hot, lower-seeded team that no favorite in its right mind wants to face.
In this year’s Class C West baseball playoff, there’s no doubt the unsung foe invoking fear is No. 6 Winthrop, which ousted No. 11 Old Orchard Beach, 9-0, from the preliminary round Tuesday afternoon.
Ben Allen spun a six-hit shutout, striking out five and steering the Ramblers to their fourth consecutive victory. Winthrop extended its shutout streak to 20 innings.
“We’re getting better every game,” said Allen, who also was 2-for-4 with two runs scored and a stolen base. “I think we’re coming together at the right time.”
Bennett Brooks went 3-for-4 and Dakota Carter drove in three runs for Winthrop (11-6), which advanced to Thursday’s quarterfinal at No. 3 St. Dom’s.
In addition to knocking out the Saints on their home field in the same round a year ago, the Ramblers are only nine days removed from beating St. Dom’s by the 10-run mercy rule.
“The kids had a great game last year against St. Dom’s to finish it up, and you just kind of see them there, but they’re not,” Winthrop coach Marc Fortin said. “It takes a while to get them back. We’re feeling pretty good right now with our defense, and the boys hit the ball. It’s taken a while.”
Hunter Boutot and Nate Doody each had two hits for OOB (6-11). Kendel Tatsak was solid on the mound for the Seagulls, striking out five, walking only one and allowing only three earned runs.
Allen, a junior left-hander, did not issue a walk.
“I threw a lot of strikes,” Allen said. “My curve wasn’t great, but my two-seam and four-seam (fastball) and change-up were OK. We did a good job of getting ahead.”
The pitchers exchanged goose eggs until the bottom of the second, when Mario Meucci led off by reaching base on the first of eight OOB errors.
Allen’s infield single drew an errant throw that placed the runners at second and third prior to a double by Carter.
Carter was erased at the plate on the back end of a double play, but another infield hit by Brooks and two additional errors made it 3-0.
“We’re starting to get a little bit more disciplined,” said Carter, who caught Allen’s shutout. “Just getting the bats going and hitting their pitcher was the biggest thing.”
Singles by Doody and Tyler Scott gave the Seagulls first-and-third with one out in the third. Allen subsequently struck out Brendan Kaliher and coaxed a groundout from Dylan Creswell to escape his toughest jam of the day.
Two more errors led to three runs in the Winthrop third. Mario Meucci’s double, Carter’s single and Brooks’ ground ball produced the RBIs.
Cabot Lancaster lined a two-run single in the fifth. Meucci reached on a miscue and scored on another in the sixth.
Allen didn’t have a 1-2-3 inning after the second.
Doody was stranded in scoring position three times. The Seagulls left six in all.
“We knew they had a couple of good hitters, but Ben was just first strike, every time, coming right at them,” Fortin said. “It’s taken him a while to warm up. It’s taken the whole team a while to warm up, actually.”
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