HARTFORD, CONN. – The No. 6 seeded Roger Williams baseball team is set to matchup against the No. 4 seeded Western New England Golden Bears on Thursday morning in a Conference of New England quarterfinal battle.
The Hawks and Golden Bears will matchup just four days following their weekend doubleheader in Bristol, R.I. which saw the two teams split the series. The Hawks win in game one over WNE pushed Roger Williams into the CNE playoff tournament as the No. 6 seed.
Roger Williams comes into the matchup having recently falling to Hartford 5-2 in a first-round game of the CNE playoff tournament. Western New England downed No. 5 Suffolk on Wednesday afternoon, before falling to the top seeded Gulls, forcing them into the loser's bracket alongside the Hawks. Hosting the battle between Western and Roger will be the No. 3 Hartford Hawks, who serves as the highest seed in the loser's bracket.
The matchup tomorrow morning will serve as a rematch of last season's playoff battle, a game that saw the Golden Bear's end the Hawks season with a 4-3 win, before they would eventually fall to Endicott who would be crowned conference champions.
Lucas Lariviere is expecting to take the ball in tomorrow mornings game, as he has headlined the Hawks starters all season. Lariviere is no stranger to the Golden Bears, as he started against them in last year's playoff matchup and recently toed the rubber on Saturday afternoon in the Hawks win over WNE. Lariviere has led the Hawks in innings with 49.2 across nine starts. He has held opponents to an impressive .208 average along the way as well.
Some hitters to keep an eye on for the Hawks would be
Ty Cali,
Owen Hibbard, and
Will Florio. Recently moved into the leadoff spot, Cali leads the team in batting average, and is 6-6 on stolen base attempts. Hibbard, currently batting .290, leads the squad in stolen bases with nine, and currently holds an impressive 13:11 K:BB ratio. In the regular season when Hawks visited Fiondella Field, Florio popped two homeruns in route to a win, while also leading the team with five homeruns.
For the Golden Bears, keep an eye on Jack Loftus, John Bova, and Ryan Montini who have led the way in the hitting department atop the order. Loftus currently holds a .378 average to go along with a team best 1.214 OPS across 143 at bats. Loftus has complied 54 hits and a team-best 10 long balls in addition to another team-best in RBIs with 36. Bova, the shortstop, doesn't come in too far behind, with an average of .360 and OPS of 1.006. Lastly, the leadoff hitter, Montini holds a .333 mark of his own with 52 hits including 10 doubles. Montini also holds an impressive 27:27 SO/BB ratio, which leads the team.
The winner of the matchup between the Hawks and the Golden Bears will be right back in action to take on the winner of No. 3 Hartford and No. 5 Suffolk.
