The McLean Highlanders traveled to Stone Bridge High School on Tuesday, March 28^th for a Liberty District contest against the Bulldogs. It was the first ever meeting between the two schools. The game figured to be a pitchers duel between the Highlander’s Danny Bell, and Stone Bridge’s Ryan Shugars, two of the Northern Region’s finest Senior hurlers. Neither pitcher disappointed, as Bell again was very sharp in his second outing of the season, holding an excellent Bulldog offense to just one earned run over 5 2/3 innings. McLean had many opportunities to win the ballgame, but 5 errors and a pair of costly base running mistakes were too much to overcome as Stone Bridge prevailed, 4-3. One of the lone bright spots defensively for MHS was the performance of David Roffman, who replaced an injured Jimmy Bodson in the third inning and was very sound behind the plate for the final 4 innings.

"Danny Bell threw the ball extremely well for us again", McLean Head Coach John Thomas said. "We have to do a better job capitalizing on the pitching we’ve been getting. We had an opportunity to beat a very good team in Stone Bridge tonight, but with some of the mental errors we made, we did not deserve to win."

The Highlanders did not have to wait long for a shot at redemption. On Wednesday, March 29^th, McLean hosted the St. Albans Bulldogs on Opening Night at McLean Baseball Field. Again, this was the first ever meeting between the Highlanders and St. Albans, a private school competing in the Independent Athletic Conference. St. Albans entered the game carrying a #7 ranking in The Washington Post and a roster with three Division 1 baseball signees, including starting pitcher Will Krasne, who has committed to Stanford. Krasne was brilliant for the Bulldogs, going the distance and striking out 12 McLean hitters, but was still out dueled by the Highlander combination of Andrew Stowe and Shane Mills, who combined on a 3 hit shutout. McLean scored the only run of the ballgame in the 5^th inning when Kyle Meagher was plated on an error by the Bulldogs second baseman. Bird Sweeny and Mike McCollough made their first starts of the year for the Highlanders, and both made significant contributions defensively. Drew Morgan led the offense with two line drive base hits.

"To beat a team of St. Albans caliber on Opening Night is a big step for our program." Coach Thomas commented. "To beat a pitcher like Krasne on a night when he threw the ball as well as he did is even bigger. We know that in order to beat good teams we must get excellent pitching, play great defense, execute on offense, and be enthusiastic. Tonight we did all four things to the best of our ability. This was a great team win!"

McLean was back at it again on Friday, March 31^st, hosting the Colonials of Thomas Jefferson High School for a Friday night Liberty District matchup. Despite a slow start and some timely hitting early on by the Colonials, McLean was able to regroup and win the ballgame 11-6. Shane Mills and Tyler Thompson combined to drive in 6 runs for the Highlanders, and Bird Sweeny added three stolen bases. Pat Tawil, Nick Vanderhye, James Pascoe, and Sammy Kaiser all made solid contributions on the basepaths for McLean, scoring a combined 3 runs. Frankie Cavanaugh earned his first win of the year out of the bullpen for McLean, providing 3 1/3 innings of shutout relief. Shane Mills came on with two outs in the sixth to earn his first save of the year.

"Frankie Cavanaugh was outstanding tonight", Coach Thomas said. "Our bullpen has to be outstanding for us to be successful, and tonight we got exactly what we needed. We believe that Shane Mills is the best closer in the Northern Region, but we have to be able to get him the ball when our starting pitcher has an off-night, as was the case tonight. Frankie has worked very hard to improve his pitching, and we were very happy to be able to get him his first Varsity win against TJ."