Baseball Returns to Beanpot

Behind a solo home run by sophomore Hal Carey, solid pitching by junior Bart Brush and a host of errors by the Eagles, the Harvard baseball team trounced Boston College, 9-2, yesterday in the first game of the annual Beanpot Tournament at Fenway Park.

The win marks Harvard's first in a Beanpot opener since 1993 and its fifth in six games since a sobering doubleheader loss to Princeton two weekends ago.

"We got a lot of breaks but overall our pitching was excellent and our hitting was superb, so I guess that equals a 9-2 score," said junior Aaron Kessler, who racked up four of his team's 14 hits on the afternoon.

Carey got the party started in the second. With two outs and nobody on, he pulled a pitch over Fenway's celebrated Green Monster. The ball bounced off the foul pole for a solo shot, giving Harvard (18-10) a 1-0 lead.

"It was probably the first ball I've pulled like that all season," said Carey, who was homerless in his college career until yesterday. "Getting my first collegiate home run at Fenway Park was tremendous."

An inning after Carey's blast, the Crimson mounted a two-out rally to tack on two more runs. The big knock in the inning was an RBI double by sophomore Andrew Huling to drive in Kessler.

As it turned out, three runs was all Brush (1-2) needed. He recorded his first win of the season by spreading eight hits over eight innings before sophomore Garrett Vail came in to clean up in the ninth.

Brush took a 9-0 lead into the eighth inning, but Eagles first baseman Sean McGowan broke up the shutout attempt with a two-run blast over the Green Monster.

One of the biggest parts of Harvard's offense yesterday was B.C.'s lackluster defense. The Eagles committed four errors in the Crimson's four-run fifth, including two errors on a miscued grounder off the bat of junior Brian Ralph.

The Eagles' inauspicious effort in the field only added to an otherwise dominant offensive performance by the Crimson. Among Harvard's four hits in the fifth was a booming RBI double by captain Peter Albers that just missed clearing the Green Monster.

Yesterday was not the first time Harvard's offense was able to post big numbers against B.C.'s pitching staff. The Crimson scored 14 runs against the Eagles in a win last week.

"I guess we just have their number," Kessler said. "We hit well against them and they seem to not be able to hit our pitching. I wouldn't mind playing them every day."

With yesterday's win, Harvard will have an opportunity to avenge last year's 13-2 opening-round loss to UMass in last season's Beanpot. The Minutemen squeaked out a 1-0 victory over Northeastern in the second game of the afternoon at Fenway and will play the Crimson in tomorrow's championship game.

Harvard beat UMass the last time the two teams locked horns, a beanballplagued 11-10 upset.

"It will be an interesting matchup," Kessler said. "We'll be better prepared [than in last year's loss]. We want to show them that they're not the only good team in New England."