Navs Snag First Win of 2026 in Sanford

SANFORD, Maine — Three early runs and an outstanding pitching performance lifted the North Shore Navigators to a 4-2 win over the host Sanford Mainers in Saturday night's New England Collegiate Baseball League game at Goodall Park.

Left fielder Grant Hunter (Binghamton) highlighted a 2-for-3 night with a two-run home run in the second inning before executing the front end of a double steal in the sixth, helping the Navs (1-1) build a 4-0 lead and hold off the Mainers (1-1) late for their first win of the young summer.

Shortstop Michael Brown (Hofstra) had hits in his first two at-bats, while Peabody native first baseman Danati Fronduto (San Jacinto) went 1-for-2 with two runs scored and two walks.

The North Shore pitching staff did the rest. John Hegarty (Cornell) and former St. Mary's High School teammates Josh Doney (UMass Lowell) and Jack Zimmerman (Dayton) all worked multiple innings of scoreless baseball, with Hegarty pitching three hitless and scoreless innings in his start. 

Lynn's own Doney posted the victory in relief, pitching the following two innings of one-hit ball with three strikeouts. 

After third baseman Jason Bello (Dayton) started an around-the-horn double play to help Hegarty through the first inning in the minimum three batters, North Shore took the opening lead on one loud swing of the bat.

The first run-scoring frame began with Fronduto working a leadoff walk before Hunter came up two batters later and deposited the first pitch he saw in a Navs uniform out over deep left field for a two-run homer.

Another leadoff baserunner turned into a 3-0 lead an inning later, as right fielder Grayson Carpenter (Dayton) drew a walk and immediately reached third on Brown's infield single and a subsequent throwing error. Bello drove the run home on a sacrifice fly to deep center.

Hegarty faced the minimum through his three hitless and scoreless innings, bookending the second with both of his strikeouts. Entering in relief, Doney tossed a 1-2-3 fourth with a strikeout and worked around a one-out double by Sanford first baseman Steven Kraus (Binghamton) and a two-out walk to post another zero.

The North Shore lead reached 4-0 in the sixth. Fronduto knocked a leadoff single up the middle, took second on a passed ball and moved up to third on Hunter's knock into left. With Nahant native catcher Jace Roossien (Boston College) in a two-strike count, Hunter triggered a double steal that allowed Fronduto to scamper home. 

Sanford broke up the combined shutout bid on center fielder Nick Zampieron's (Stony Brook) run-scoring single in the sixth. The score could have tightened if not for stellar relief from Ethan Hunt (New Orleans), who entered the game with runners on the corners and nobody out and retired two of the next three batters by way of the strikeout.

Former North Shore left fielder Nater Wachter (UConn) knocked another RBI hit to center to bring the Mainers within 4-2, but that was as close as the home team would get. The Revere native Zimmerman stranded a runner on third upon entering the game in the eighth and then closing out a save in the ninth.

The Navs complete their two-game divisional road trip on Sunday night against the Vermont Mountaineers in Montpelier. First pitch at Montpelier Recreation Field is set for 6:30 p.m.