As their early season trek around New England continues, the nomadic Ocean State Waves fell to the Keene Swamp Bats 4-3 on Tuesday night, the second one-run loss of 2024.

A tug-of-war through the first five innings, Keene and the Waves traded offensive blows starting with the SwampBats in the bottom of the first. The inning was led off with a single from Alex Alicea who advanced to third on a fielding error in right field. He was driven home by the very next batter Joe Jaconski whose double to left field sent Alicea home to crack open the scoring for the evening 1-0.

However, the lead was short lived for Keene as a Greg Pettay single to center brought in Donovan Cash, evening up the game at 1-1.

The bottom half of the inning saw the SwampBats take the lead right back though. Brett House unleashed a ball to deep left center field, a solo shot that granted Keene with a 2-1 advantage.

The Waves were not a team that would go quietly into the night just yet though, as the top of the third saw Aaron Walton’s single to right field bring home both Tristan Head and Cash to give the Waves their first lead of the ballgame 3-2.

A rare scoreless fourth inning after the seesaw scoring through the first three innings was sequelled with a more conventional fifth inning that saw Keen bring home the final runs of the ballgame. A wild-pitch with the bases loaded brought Jaconski in from third and Andrew Wiggins home from second, putting the scoreboard into its finishing position of 4-3.

The lack of scoring in the final stages was due to two different arms coming from separate bullpens. Ocean State’s Joseph Hauser tossed 3.1 scoreless innings with six strikeouts while Keene’s Issac Williams dismissed five Waves batters in just 3.0 innings.

The Waves have an off day before they return to coastal division action on the road in Lynn when they take on the North Shore Navigators tomorrow night at 6:05 p.m. from Frasier Field.