ORONO – The University of Maine has submitted a bid to host an NCAA regional baseball tournament this year, according to athletic director Patrick Nero.

“We met the $35,000 minimum [guarantee]. We are the only school north of Maryland to put in a bid,” said Nero.

Maine submitted a bid last year, but Northeastern won the America East Tournament and earned the automatic berth to the NCAA Tournament.

Nero said the NCAA was “appreciative” of Maine’s bid since it’s rare for a school from the Northeast to submit one.

Improvements made to Mahaney Diamond should help Maine’s chances of hosting one of the 16 four-team regionals, he explained.

“We added the chairbacks [to two sets of bleacher seats] and we’ve got a new press box,” said Nero, who feels hosting a regional would be “wonderful” for the area.

However, Maine had plenty of work to do on the field before entertaining aspirations of hosting a regional.

Maine’s 6-3 loss to Stony Brook Friday afternoon left the Bears needing three wins to annex the America East championship.

Maine took the first step, beating Albany 11-5 Friday night, and now must take a pair from Stony Brook, which advanced to the championship round with wins over Northeastern and Maine.

Maine last hosted a regional in 1991. It hosted six NCAA Northeast Regionals between 1980 and 1991.

Seawolves taming Bears

Stony Brook has now won five of the last six meetings with Maine.

“For whatever reason, we seem to match up well against certain clubs,” said Stony Brook coach Matt Senk. “But there’s still a lot of tournament to play and we could end up playing Maine again.”

The Seawolves got off to a 1-5 start in America East play, but won four of their last five series to earn the fourth seed. The only series they lost in that stretch was to Maryland Baltimore County, which finished seventh in the eight-team league.

That has helped them prepare for the tournament.

“We’ve been playing pressure games all season,” said Senk.

The Seawolves tied for sixth in the conference in fielding percentage during the regular season (.946), but they’ve made only one error in their first two games. The Seawolves made several gems against Maine, including a run-saving diving stop by third baseman Nick Theoharis off Aaron Izaryk in the seventh inning.

“This team goes the way its confidence goes,” said Senk. “We can be our own worst enemy when we aren’t playing with confidence. When we’re confident, we play up to our potential.”

He said there is one thing that has been consistent all season.

“Our kids always play hard,” said Senk.