COURTESY PHOTO
Lynn native Kyle O’Connor enjoyed a solid freshman year at the University of Southern Maine.
By JOSHUA KUMMINS
BOSTON — The season came to a sudden end for the University of Southern Maine baseball team last week with two losses at the Little East Conference Tournament. However, a pair of locals made the most of their freshman campaigns with the Huskies.
Despite their rookie status, Lynn’s Kyle O’Connor and Peabody’s Matt Correale proved to be vital contributors to a 29-win squad that finished tied for the top spot in the LEC standings.
Nine players on the USM roster call Massachusetts home, but O’Connor and Correale hit it off right away as two players from the same area of the state.
“Coming up to school, I didn’t know too many kids,” O’Connor said. “I knew (Correale) a little bit from high school and played against him. When we got there, we kind of just clicked because we knew we were kind of the only ones from the same area.”
O’Connor was the Huskies’ top freshman appearing in more than 20 games this season as he hit an even .300 in his 80 at-bats, including hits in four of his final six outings. The Lynn English alum legged out two triples, hit a home run, stole three bases, and drove in eight total runs on the year.
The Huskies endured injuries at the beginning of the season, but the emergence of freshmen like O’Connor and Correale means that the future looks bright for head coach Ed Flaherty’s program.
At the beginning of the season, Flaherty considered redshirting O’Connor. However, as the Huskies got closer to their annual Florida trip, things began to change.
It can be challenging for baseball coaches in New England to get a good handle on incoming players during the fall season and through indoor work, but O’Connor made improvements over time and has become a steady performer.
“Before we went (to Florida), he started out hitting it and I put him in there,” Flaherty said of O’Connor. “And he’s played a lot for us. He’s a good contact hitter, has some power, and can run. He’s going to be a future star.”
The Huskies used a pair of freshmen in the starting rotation regularly, but Correale was often a go-to man out of the bullpen. Despite just a 1-3 record, the former Tanners star converted four save opportunities and struck out 24 batters in his 34.1 innings of work.
Both Correale and O’Connor agreed that the speed of the game was the most pressing adjustment.
“It was definitely a faster game,” Correale said. “But Coach (Ed) Boyce taught us a lot, just to go out and throw strikes. He said that we might be freshmen, but just to go out, have fun and do what you do. Just let it flow.”
Correale did not allow an earned run over his first eight collegiate appearances before running into trouble later in the season. He finished strong individually
“Matty pitched very well out of the shoot,” said Flaherty, USM’s 31st-year skipper. “He’s a freshman and he had some setbacks later in the year, but he’ll overcome those as he gets older. He has a good arm and is a real competitive kid.”
The talk of the USM baseball program this year was senior shortstop Sam Dexter, who was named to the preseason watch list for the USA Baseball’s Golden Spikes Award, given annually to the nation’s top amateur player.
The reigning D3Baseball.com National Player of the Year, Dexter ranked third in the LEC with a .404 average this season. O’Connor said he learned a lot from Dexter, and senior outfielders Jake Glauser and Nick Dibiase, along the way as a first-year collegian.
“Sam’s a gifted player. What he brings to the table emotionally, and his talent, makes you better automatically,” O’Connor said of Dexter, whose younger brother Jake Dexter is set to play for the Futures Collegiate Baseball League’s North Shore Navigators at Fraser Field this summer. “And having two seniors in the outfield with me, working with me also really helped me step up my game.”
Names and notes
- Lynn’s Cam O’Neill went 2-for-3 with two walks, a run scored and three RBI as the Holy Cross baseball team advanced to the Patriot League Championship Series with a 12-8 win over Lehigh on Sunday.
- Classical alum Hulerie McGuffie finished second in the 200-meter dash at Saturday’s NEICAAA Outdoor Championship at Southern Connecticut State, helping UMass Boston finished tenth out of 38 teams. Her time of 24.33 seconds broke a Beacons record that stood for nearly 30 years. McGuffie also ran the 400-meter in 54.91, the fastest time of any Division III runner.
- Tuft’s sophomore Andrew DiMaiti earned a spot on the All New England Track team with a third place finish in the 400-meter hurdles on Saturday (5-14) running a very fast time of 53.01 while competing in the New England Intercollegiate Athletic Association Championship Meet. The 53.01 ranks DiMaiti 11th nationally in Division III.
- Last Tuesday, Peabody’s Antonia Pagliuca was named the Assumption College female athlete of the week. Pagliuca claimed the 10,000-meter title at the Northeast-10 Outdoor Championship, and finished fourth in the 5,000.
- Peabody’s Brandon Bingel went 3-for-4 with a double, RBI and two runs scored and Saugus’ Buck McCarthy went 1-for-3 with a double and run scored for Bryant University as the baseball team clinched its fifth-straight Northeast Conference regular season championship with a 9-2 victory over Central Connecticut on Saturday. McCarthy also went 2-for-4 with three runs scored in Bryant’s 9-3 win over Central Connecticut.
- Nahant’s Kurtis White went 2-for-4 with a RBI in Franklin Pierce’s 6-4 loss to Saint Rose on Friday.
- Peabody’s Bobby Losanno led the Merrimack baseball team with a .345 average as the Warriors ended their season with 29 wins, the second-most in program history.
- North Shore Navigator and Salem State senior Richie Fecteau was named the National Collegiate Baseball Writers’ Association Division III Hitter of the Week. Fecteau hit .800 (12-for-15) with three home runs, two double, eight runs scored and a 1.533 slugging percentage over three games in the MASCAC tournament. He went 7-for-8 with three home runs and four RBI in the championship series.
Joshua Kummins can be reached at joshuakummins95@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @JoshuaKummins.