Sunday’s doubleheader wins helped the Beavers sweep the weekend’s four-game series with the visiting Chargers.

UMF improved to 23-14 overall and 15-9 in the conference, becoming the only team in the 63-year history of Beaver baseball to record twenty or more wins. Saturday, the team broke the previous mark of 19 held by the 1988 squad coached by Bob Leib.

Colby-Sawyer’s season comes to a conclusion with a 13-23 overall, 8-16 record.

“We’ve battled all year,” UMF coach Chris Bessey, who recently received the 2016 Al Card Sportsmanship Award, presented by the Collegiate Baseball Umpires Association of Maine, said. “I like what we have done all year, our pitching was good and we played good defense.”

UMF’s Kyle Peterson, who played high school ball at Telstar in Bethel, hurled a complete game, 4-0 three-hit shutout, in the opener while Jory Humphrey (Erskine) earned the 9-1 win in the nightcap with relief help from Mark Leahy and Kevin Carter.

Peterson (5-2) featured a two-seam fastball and a lazy breaking pitch to escape a host of nasty jams to earn the shutout.

“This was pretty emotional, it was really good to get a win,” Peterson said. “I usually like to throw the two-seamer but when they start to catch up to it, we go with the curve ball.”

In the first, fifth and sixth innings Peterson found himself in trouble with runners on first and second in both instances. Going to the breaking pitch he was able to notch strikeouts on all three occasions to preserve the shutout.

“Couldn’t ask for a better combination of offense and defense like we had today,” Peterson said. “We had some timely hitting in both games.”

UMF took a 1-0 lead in the third inning on a bases loaded sacrifice fly off the bat of Ben Keene and added a second run when the Chargers committed an infield error on Tom Grady’s hard hit infield ground ball.

Sean Cabaniss (Erskine) paced the Beavers’ eight-hit attack with a pair of base hits.

In the second game, Jimmy Neal (Mt. Blue) provided the offensive spark the Beavers needed to secure the win. Neal contributed a two-RBI single in a four-run second inning and a two-run home run to deep right field in the third, helping UMF take an early 9-0 lead.

“There pitchers were struggling in the second game, so I started looking for a fastball on the inside part of the plate,” Neal said. “I got what I was looking for and hit it well.”

Humphrey (4-1) allowed just three hits in four and a third innings to earn the win.

UMF will play Husson University on Friday in the first round of the North Atlantic Conference baseball playoffs. The double-elimination tournament will be hosted by Castleton State University in Vermont.

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