Thomas strong after shaky start Lumberjacks subdue Spirit

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BANGOR – As they have for much of this season, the Bangor Lumberjacks rode another quality pitching effort to victory on a cool, clear evening at Winkin Complex.

Adam Thomas survived early control problems for a quality start, the relief corps threw three innings of no-hit, shutout ball while Mark Burke and Brian Baker provided the offense to lift Bangor to a 3-1 win over North Shore of Lynn, Mass., Wednesday night.

The Lumberjacks improve to 28-13 in Northeast League second-half play and stay within one game of North Division leader Quebec. North Shore, Bangor’s possible first-round playoff opponent, is now 25-15.

“We want to win the second half, but this is important too because they’ve beaten us around a little bit this year and we need to let them know we can play with them,” said Bangor manager Kash Beauchamp.

Thomas (9-5) notched two quick outs in the first, but then walked the bases loaded on 15 pitches before getting a visit from pitching coach Kevin Pincavitch.

“He was trying to throw a bastard pitch every pitch and he ended up getting behind every time. I told him to just trust his stuff,” Pincavitch said. “From then on in, he looked the pitcher he is. It was just a mental thing.”

From there, Thomas struck out the next hitter to end the threat and three of the next four batters en route to nine total with just four walks and five hits over six innings. John Rohlfing, Isaac Pavlik and John Mangieri combined to keep the Spirit hitless the rest of the way.

“They’ve got some pretty good pitchers on this ballclub,” said North Shore manager John Kennedy. “Not just starters … They’ve got guys they can bring into the middle and the end who are pretty good and that’s what it’s going to boil down to in the end and they have a pretty good staff.”

North Shore jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the third on Rob Fischer’s one-out, 370-foot solo home run to left.

Bangor ended Klae Calvert’s bid for a no-hitter and shutout with one swing of the bat – specifically Burke’s – with two out in the fourth. Burke whacked a 1-1 changeup to right for a 350-foot shot. Burke barely missed another homer in the sixth with a double off the base of the wall in left.

“Yeah, the guys have been giving me a hard time all year about not having opposite field power and I thought I hit that one good, but I guess that was just fuel for their fire,” Burke said with a laugh.

The Lumberjacks tacked on two more in the fifth. Brian Baker belted a solo homer to left with one out. Paul Powell followed Baker’s shot with a walk and Rolando Bello singled him to second. After Powell moved to third on a flyout to right, he scored by stealing home plate on a delayed double steal. Bello also stole second on the play.

LUMBERJACKS 3, SPIRIT 1

North Shore (25-15) Bangor (28-13)

Player AB R H BI Player AB R H BI

Agramonte, 2b 4 0 1 0 Garcia, rf 3 0

Granger, 2b 0 0 0 0 Hargreaves, c 3 0 0

Teilon, 3b 4 0 0 0 Kohno, cf 4 0 0

Davilla, 1b 3 0 0 0 Burke, 1b 4 1 1

Fischer, cf 3 1 1 1 Davis, 3b 2 0 0

Hastings, lf 3 0 0 0 Tranum, dh 4 0 0

Oglesby, dh 2 0 0 0 Baker, lf 3 1 1

Charles, c 4 0 2 0 Powell, ss 2 1 0

Macchi, rf 4 0 1 0 Bello, 2b 3 0 0

Sanchez, ss 3 0 0 0

Totals 30 1 5 1 Totals 28 3 4 2

New Jersey 001 000 000 ? 1

Bangor 000 120 00x ? 3

E?Agramonte; LOB?North Shore 7, Bangor 6; 2B?Burke; HR?Fischer (9); Burke (16), Baker (2); DP?Bangor; SB?Powell, Bello

New Jersey IP H R ER BB SO

Calvert (L,3-2) 6 4 3 3 3 8

Bell 2 0 0 0 2 2

Bangor IP H R ER BB SO

Thomas (W,9-5) 6 5 1 1 4 9

Rohlfing 1 0 0 0 0 2

Pavlik 1 0 0 0 0 1

Mangieri (S,1) 1 0 0 0 1 0

BK?Thomas; T?2:42; ATT?1,001