The Red Sox defeated Boston College 6-0 and Northeastern 13-2, once again sweeping their traditional doubleheader against local collegiate teams.
It didn't take long for the Sox to get their offense going against BC. Marco Scutaro and Dustin Pedroia walked to lead off the bottom of the first inning, setting up Kevin Youkilis for the team's first three RBI of the year on an opposite field home run.
While that sort of power hitting wouldn't continue, the Sox were in a very patient mindset for the first game of the year, taking seven more free passes in the game. A figure they would later top against Northeastern.
The Sox would add another pair of runs in the third inning as top prospect Ryan Kalish, getting the start in center field, singled one in before Lars Anderson drove in another on a sacrifice fly. A second sac fly in the sixth scored the Sox' final run of the game, part of a small rally that included Ino Guerrero, the team's batting practice pitcher, taking a walk in his annual trip to the plate.
Of course, the Sox didn't need anything after Kevin Youkilis' homer, because the pitching staff was busy flirting with an all-important spring training no-hitter. Stolmy Pimentel got the start and breezed through a pair of innings. Michael Bowden, Jason Rice, Clevelan Santeliz, and Matt Fox did the same (Santeliz' walk to Mike Sudol was the only blemish, but he struck out the side to make up for it). The effort was broken up when Randy Williams allowed a single to Jim Laufer, who was quickly gunned down by Alex Hassan, trying to stretch it into two bases.
The second game against Northeastern was actually a rather tense affair for the first few innings. Starter Kyle Weiland got off to a very bad start, allowing a first-pitch home run to third baseman Ryan Maguire. And thanks to the Sox wasting a pair of bases loaded opportunities, the Huskies actually managed to extend their lead to 2-0 come the fourth inning, taking one more off of Rich Hill.
That didn't last long. The Sox finally got down to scoring some runs in the bottom of the fourth, taking five in the inning before grabbing eight more over the next two. That's thirteen runs on a total of just six hits! How do they manage that? Simple: twelve walks for the Sox, and seven errors for Northeastern. The best performance of the game came from Jose Iglesias, who picked up a pair of hits for the Sox, while Che-Hsuan Lin and Yamaico Navarro walked twice a piece.
That's two down, and 35 to go before we hit the real stuff.