LANCASTER, Pa. — The St. Mary’s College of Maryland baseball team (1-9) kicked off conference play with a doubleheader against the Lancaster Bible College Chargers (8-8) on March 15, 2025, splitting the games with a 15-10 victory in the opener and a 19-1 loss in the second game. The Seahawks, representing a Division III program in St. Mary’s City, secured their first win of the season in dramatic fashion but struggled to maintain momentum in the nightcap.
Game 1: Seahawks Surge to 15-10 Win
St. Mary’s jumped ahead in the second inning, taking a 2-0 lead as George Berbakos scored on a wild pitch and Rhett Fletcher added an RBI single. Lancaster Bible responded with a run in the bottom half, but the Seahawks extended their lead to 4-1 in the third with unearned runs from Aaron Wathen and Avery Sims. The Chargers seized a 5-4 lead with a four-run third inning, but St. Mary’s answered decisively.
Adrian Auber turned the tide with back-to-back two-run home runs in the fourth and fifth innings, pushing the Seahawks to a 10-5 advantage. The momentum continued in the sixth, where Cole Tarleton’s home run and two unearned runs from Berbakos and Ian Walters stretched the lead to 12-5. Tarleton struck again in the eighth with a two-run homer, scoring Sims and himself, making it 14-5. Despite a late rally from Lancaster Bible, cutting the score to 14-8, Wathen’s unearned run in the ninth sealed a 15-10 victory for St. Mary’s.
Auber and Tarleton led the offense, each driving in four runs with two home runs apiece. Tarleton had three hits, while Auber and Fletcher each added two. Pitcher Ryder Chalk earned the win, striking out six over 28 batters faced, with Nick Russo and Adam Ferony providing relief.
Game 2: Chargers Dominate in 19-1 Rout
The second game saw Lancaster Bible take control early, scoring 19 unanswered runs over the first five innings, leaving St. Mary’s trailing 19-0. The Seahawks avoided a shutout in the sixth when Kyle Cantanzaro’s RBI single scored Trevor Smith, but the lone run couldn’t spark a comeback, ending the game at 19-1.
Six Seahawks—Sims, Tarleton, Fletcher, Walters, Cantanzaro, and Corey Brown—each recorded a hit, with Cantanzaro driving in the team’s only run. Jordan Bonhoff took the loss, supported by relievers Jack Overton, Aidan Manning, Colin Patterson, and David Baggott.
Impact in St. Mary’s County
The split offers a mixed start for St. Mary’s in the United East Conference, a critical juncture for a team seeking to turn around a challenging 1-9 season. St. Mary’s County, with a population of 113,000, rallies behind the Seahawks, who play at JLR Stadium on the college’s campus. The program, serving a student body of 1,600, has struggled with consistency, as seen in their 12-28 record in 2024, but the Game 1 offensive outburst—15 runs on 10 hits, including four home runs—signals potential. However, the 19-1 defeat in Game 2 exposes pitching vulnerabilities, with the staff surrendering 19 runs on an unspecified number of hits, a concern as they face Valley Forge next on March 22 in Phoenixville, Pa., for a doubleheader at 12:00 and 3:00 p.m.
The Seahawks’ reliance on key contributors like Auber and Tarleton, who combined for eight RBIs in Game 1, is a double-edged sword—while effective, it highlights a lack of depth in a roster that managed just one run across the second game. In a county where baseball fosters community pride, with local youth programs feeding into the college, St. Mary’s must address these inconsistencies to build momentum in conference play.
