BOSTON, Mass. - For the first time since 2000, UMass (11-14) won the Beanpot Championship by defeating the Boston College Eagles (18-18), 4-3, behind a fantastic pitching performance from Mike Dicato (Winthrop, Mass.) on Tuesday afternoon at Fenway Park. DiCato took a no-hitter into the ninth inning before allowing a bloop single with no outs. The Eagles looked to make a comeback in the bottom of the ninth, but Mitchell Eilenberg (Brooklyn, N.Y.) shut down the Eagle's offense by retiring the final two batters of the game for his second save of the season. BC's starter, Kevin Moran, struggled in the top of the first, allowing three runs to give UMass a 3-0 lead. Brian Baudinet (Watertown, Conn.) and Jim Macdonald (Cheshire, Conn.) each finished with two hits for UMass.

DiCato's performance stirred up memories of the last UMass no-hitter, the third in the program's history, thrown by Scott Barnsby at Fenway Park in the 1997 Beanpot vs. Northeastern, 1-0. After starting the game by retiring the first seven batters of the game before allowing a walk, DiCato went on to get out 15 of the next 16 batters. It looked like BC's Sam Shaughnessy was going to have BC's first hit leading off the sixth inning with a deep drive to right field, but Mike Donato (East Hartford, Conn.) made an impressive over-the-shoulder catch on the run in front of the 380 ft. sign.

UMass jumped on the Eagles early, putting up three first inning runs. A single, walk, and error on a sacrifice bunt loaded the bases for Macdonald, who singled sharply to left to score the games first run. Donato followed that up with another run-scoring single to left and Bryan Garrity (Peabody, Mass.) hit a sacrifice fly that made it 3-0.

Ted Ratliff relieved Moran after an inning and shut out the Minutemen for 5 1/3 innings before giving way to Nick Asselin. Andrew Black (Baltimore, Md.) led off the top of the ninth with a single, advanced on an Andy Tuetken (Smithfield, R.I.) bunt, and scored on Kyle Multner's (Peabody, Mass.) single to left, which proved to be the game-winning run.

DiCato finally started to show signs of tiring in the ninth, walking the first two batters before Tony Sanchez hit fly ball to short right-center that found an open spot between fielders. A fielder's choice followed, driving in BC's first run, and a single to right made it a 4-2 game.

That marked the end of DiCato's run. Eilenberg hit the first batter he faced, before allowing a sacrifice fly to John Spatola that made it a 4-3 game. With tying run at second, the junior right-hander struck out Shaughnessy to end the game.

These same two teams will go at it again on Wednesday, this time in Chestnut Hill at Eddie Pellagrini Diamond. First pitch is slated for 3 p.m.