MANSFIELD, CONN. 5/18/12 – The Keene State College baseball team saw its season come to an end with 6-1 loss to St. Joseph's College of Maine at the NCAA Division III Baseball Regional Tournament played at Eastern Stadium in Mansfield, Conn. on Friday.

Needing a win to stay alive in the tournament, the fourth seeded Owls finish their season with a 32-15 record, the programs' fourth 30-plus win campaign in the past seven seasons. The second seeded Monks (39-6), who haven't dropped back-to-back games all season, move on to play fifth seed Western New England College in another elimination game tonight at 7:45 p.m.

St. Joseph's scored all of its runs in the first two innings. The Monks got two runs in the top of the first inning on a RBI single from freshman Joe Coyne (Duxbury, Mass.) a run-scoring double off the bat of junior Mike Pratt (Dartmouth, Mass.).  St. Joseph's took advantage of three Owl errors to score four more runs in the second inning.

The Owls had a hard time getting to sophomore pitcher Lincoln Sanborn (Standish, Maine), who painted the outside corner all game and kept Keene State batters off balanced.  The son of Monk head coach Will Sanborn, the younger Sanborn, now 7-0 on the season, tossed a complete game seven hitter against the Owls, with 10 strikeouts. 

Keene State only run came in the fifth inning.  Freshman Chuck Vogt (Windsor Locks, Conn.) had a two-out double to left field and scored on a senior Kyle Morrill's (Auburn, N.H.) bad-hop grounder to shortstop. 

Senior Erik Bergstrom (Enfield, Conn.) had the only other extra base hit for the Owls, a two-out double in the first inning. Senior Peter Burgio (Bolton, Conn.) had two of the Owls' seven hits.

Keene State could never get its bats going in the tournament, scoring just five runs and hitting .206 in the three games. 

Coming off a strong performance against Southern Maine in the Little East tournament, junior Chris Crutcher (Londonderry, N.H.), whose record drops to 6-3, left the game with two outs in the second inning.  He gave up six runs (three earned) on three hits while walking three.

Hoping his team could get back into the game, sophomore Shawn Egan (East Hartford, Conn.) did his job in long relief, tossing 6.1 innings of three-hit ball with four strikeouts and one walk.  Junior John Coughlin (Litchfield, N.H.) retired the side in the ninth inning.

The game marked the end of their Keene State career for senior starters Larry Longo (Londonderry, N.H.), Bergstrom, Morrilll and Burgio.