BRIGHTON, Mass. — Situational hitting has been a strength for the Boston College baseball program this season, but it did not show up when the Eagles needed it most on Tuesday against Maine.
BC left 13 runners on base and were unable to generate a single run with the bases loaded on three separate occasions, which the Black Bears took advantage of.
After surrendering its lead in the bottom of the eighth to make it a 4-4 tie, Juju Stevens clobbered a two-run homer to send Maine into the lead once and for all, as the No. 22 Eagles (31-13, 14-7 Atlantic Coast) failed to score any runs in the bottom of the frame to cement the 6-4 final score.
JUJU FOR THE LEAD IN THE NINTH 🤯
A two-run BLAST to left field!!!
6-4 Black Bears!#BlackBearNation | #WinEverything pic.twitter.com/bAJKabj6HT
— Maine Baseball (@MaineBaseball) April 21, 2026
“Cesar [Gonzalez] left one pitch up to their three-hole kid, and the kid hit it on the hill,” said BC head coach Todd Interdonato. “Like, he made a mistake, but he punished them for us, too. So you got to give them a ton of credit.”
The defeat marked BC’s first midweek loss of the season and snapped its seven-game win streak heading into the matchup.
“We’re having a great year,” Interdonato said. “We’re in the middle of a great year. We’re one of the best teams in college baseball. And you know that loss, it just happens, right?”
The Black Bears (12-24, 7-5 America East) came out firing in the top of the first inning after Luke Burnham hit Maine’s leadoff batter, Nic Pepe, with his first pitch.
On Burnham’s third total pitch, Quinn Murphy roped a single into right field, advancing Pepe to third, and Troy Carpenter gave the visitors their first lead of the game with an RBI single up the middle.
After a brief mound visit, which did not include Interdonato, Juju Stevens cracked an RBI sacrifice fly to left field to make it 2-0, but the scoring paused there.
In the top of the third frame, however, Carpenter extended Maine’s lead to three with a solo shot, his 11th of the season, over the right-field wall for his second RBI of the game.
The Eagles collected a trio of hits in the bottom of the inning on respective singles from Julio Solier, Ty Mainolfi, and Nick Wang, but Jack Toomey left two stranded — Solier was previously thrown out at third attempting to steal — with a strikeout.
In the top of the fourth, Interdonato decided to pull Luke Burnham, who gave up three runs, all earned, on four hits and two walks with only one strikeout.
Right-handed pitcher Sean Hard took the mound, and he immediately walked Nolan DeAndrade, who advanced to second on a wild pitch.
DeAndrade then moved to third on Chris Bear’s fly-out to center, and Hard walked Pepe to put runners on the corners, but BC got out of the inning unscathed.
The Eagles notched their first run in the bottom of the fourth when Carter Hendrickson hit a leadoff double, followed by Luke Gallo’s RBI single to right-center.
“I thought Sean was really good in the two innings, you know, him hanging the zero in the fourth and then us tying it in the fourth,” Interdonato said. “I thought that kind of got the game back on our side.”
With two outs, Gallo stole second and Colin Larson walked, and Solier brought Gallo home with a single to center to cut BC’s deficit to 3-2.
Julio with the knock to center and Gallo scores pic.twitter.com/fDC8LBgmdv
— Boston College Baseball (@BCBirdBall) April 21, 2026
That sequence resulted in a pitching change for Maine, as left-hander Jack Donlin came in for starter Thomas Stabley, but the rally continued.
Donlin hit Mainolfi after Solier stole second to load the bases, and Wang walked to score Larson from third, knotting up the score at three apiece.
But Maine responded immediately in the top of the fifth thanks to Albert De La Rosa’s RBI double to left-center, which scored Hunter St. Denis — who had previously doubled — from second.
Toomey then stranded a trio of runners with a groundout, keeping Maine’s one-run lead afloat heading into the top of the seventh.
The Eagles finally broke through in the bottom of the eighth thanks to Wang’s RBI sacrifice fly, which scored Mainolfi from third after he had doubled and advanced on a wild pitch. But Stevens’ two-run shot came just a few minutes later, in the top of the ninth, to put the nail in BC’s coffin.
“I thought our fight, our toughness, was there again today,” Interdonato said. “And look, like, this game’s really hard. I mean, that’s our first midweek loss this year. Our guys, they played really hard. We were right there.”
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