HAVERFORD, Pa. - Hoping to improve its strength of schedule with a tough region opponent, the Haverford College baseball team added Sunday's doubleheader against visiting Keystone College, but the Giants took both games from the Fords, 13-3 and 8-1, in the non-conference twinbill.
The losses move Haverford's overall record to 32-10 while Keystone improves to 28-10. The Fords closed out Centennial Conference play last Sunday falling to Johns Hopkins University in the conference tournament's championship game.
The Giants used an eight-run third inning in Game 1 to distance themselves from the Fords. Of Keystone's 13 total runs, however, only five were of the earned run variety off Haverford pitchers Bryan Henrick and Brett Cohen.
Henrick started and allowed only one hit -- a home run -- in the first two innings but three errors proved costly in the third as Keystone sent 11 batters to the plate in their big inning. Six of the inning's runs which Henrick surrendered were unearned.
The Fords tried to battle back notching a run in the fourth and two more in the fifth but Keystone's pitching and fielding continued to thwart come-back efforts. Five times Haverford put the lead-off runner on base but three times the Giants erased threats with double-play balls.
Henrick (8-2) took the loss for Haverford while Keystone's Jeff Frost (6-4) picked up the win.
The Fords nabbed the early lead in Game 2, manufacturing a run in the bottom of the second.
Jeremy Zoll was hit by a pitch then stole second, coming in to score the game's first run two batters later when Justin Coulter lashed a single up the middle with two outs.
Keystone bounced back in the top half of the third off Haverford starter Jonny Williams, getting back-to-back home runs from Esteban Meletiche and Andrew Siano to wrest back the lead.
The Fords were unable to push any more runs across the plate, though, as Giants starter Rob Rogers and relievers Adam Krebs and Derek Alex kept Haverford from mounting a rally. Over the final five innings Haverford left runners stranded in scoring position three times -- all three with the base runner at third base.
Williams (7-3) took the loss for the Fords with Rogers (6-1) picking up the win for the Giants.
Coulter and Jeff Butera each finished the day with three hits for Haverford, and Jake Chaplin and Mike Galetta added two hits apiece. The Fords got RBIs from Louis DeRosa, Bobby Bailey, Zoll and Coulter.
Haverford entered Sunday's match-up hoping to gain a boost in its strength of schedule by playing against the Giants who are ranked fourth in the region. A split would have helped the Fords' efforts to gain an at-large bid into the NCAA tournament, but with the losses, they will have to sit tight and wait out other conference tournaments yet to be played to see if any Pool C bids fall to the Fords.
The NCAA will announce the 2011 tournament field late in the evening Sunday, May 15 or early Monday morning.