Austin Embler, of the Nighthawks, is late on his trhow to first as Grant Williams, of the Ocean State Waves, slides into him at second during the fifth inning of their game at the Maxfield Sports Complex in Hartford, Vt. Monday, July 11, 2016. (Valley News - James M. Patterson) Copyright Valley News. May not be reprinted or used online without permission. Send requests to permission@vnews.com.
Austin Embler, of the Nighthawks, is late on his trhow to first as Grant Williams, of the Ocean State Waves, slides into him at second during the fifth inning of their game at the Maxfield Sports Complex in Hartford, Vt. Monday, July 11, 2016. (Valley News - James M. Patterson) Copyright Valley News. May not be reprinted or used online without permission. Send requests to permission@vnews.com.

White River Junction – The Upper Valley Nighthawks’ top-ranked offense made skid marks coming to a halt Monday night against the NECBL-leading Ocean State Waves and their top-ranked pitching staff.

And with an important stretch of games this week against Northern Division opponents, Nighthawks head coach Nick Cenatiempo knows that his team needs to start winning sooner rather than later.

Ocean State starting pitcher Zack Bahm went seven innings for the Waves, allowing on three hits, no runs and recording three strikeouts for the victory. Upper Valley (10-15) only managed four hits in the 4-0 loss at the Maxfield Sports Complex, stranding six runners on base in its seventh loss in eight games.

“I thought their pitcher was average,” Cenatiempo said. “We made him better than he was. We played too big tonight. We hit a lot of fly balls, put a lot of balls in the air. We didn’t make the best adjustments that we should have against them. It hurt us.”

Ocean State is now 9-2 on the road this season. Upper Valley falls to 6-7 at home.

In some ways, Upper Valley fell back into its old habits after breaking a six-game losing streak in a 10-3 victory over North Adams on Friday night. Defensive miscues hurt the Nighthawks early on, including wild throws to defensive positions, bobbled plays in the infield and underhanded throws for easy outs were dropped and mishandled. Upper Valley was only marked for two errors.

Seton Hall sophomore pitcher Dylan Verdonk took the loss for Upper Valley, giving up seven hits and two earned runs in five innings of work with one strikeout.

Ocean State did its damage in the third inning as Verdonk gave up a one-out triple to Waves’ Tom Buonopane that brought home Matt Cogen from second base. Grant Williams, one of the NECBL’s top hitters, drove in Buonopane from third with an RBI single, putting Upper Valley in an early 2-0 hole.

The Waves scored twice again in the eighth inning. Mike Coss allowed lead-off singles to put runners on second and third, intentionally walking Waves’ Chris Hess to load the bases for sidearmer Nick Jones. The Kansas State product allowed an RBI groundout to Matt Cogen and an RBI single to David Real for Ocean State’s final runs.

For Cenatiempo, two off days played a big role in his team’s lack of offensive rhythm Monday night, after Saturday’s game with Keene and Sunday’s regularly scheduled game with Ocean State were rescheduled due to rain. Cenatiempo spent several minutes talking to his team near third base after Monday’s loss.

“We had too big of swings, meaning we were trying to go for the deep ball instead of shortening up,” Cenatiempo said. “We didn’t put balls hard in play. … We didn’t make quality adjustments as the game went on. When you don’t make adjustments, you get beat.

“You’re coming off a couple of off days, you get back into the mode of playing and you play an average team, or an above-average team. … You’re going to get beat if you don’t come ready to play. It affected our rhythm as a team.”

UNCW’s Zack Canada and new outfielder Shea Sullivan, an Eastern Kentucky senior from Gibsonia, Penn., made midgame appearances in the place of

Charlie Concannon and Grayson Padgett. Alex Hanson missed his second straight game with a twisted ankle.

Despite the injuries, Upper Valley’s offense remains hot and cold. For Cenatiempo, the time is now or never to start turning things around.

“It’s big,” he said on how important this next stretch of games are for his team. “It’s the season.”

Notes: The NECBL announced its full Northern Division and Southern Division rosters for Sunday’s All-Star Game at the Newport Gulls’ Cardines Field. The Nighthawks will be represented by starting outfielder Joey Denison, catcher A.J. Walden, outfielder Grayson Padgett and shortstop Al Molina. An additional spot is determined by fan voting, with each team nominating one player. The Nighthawks have nominated outfielder Hanson, from Mercer College. Fans can log on to http://vote16.necbl.com/ to cast their vote. Voting ends at 11:59 p.m. on Thursday. … Nighthawks shortstop Matt Maul is leaving the Upper Valley on Friday. He is scheduled to have surgery on his non-throwing shoulder on July 20. … Seton Hall’s Billy Layne will get the mound start tonight as Upper Valley hosts the Plymouth Pilgrims at Maxfield. Game time is 6:30 p.m.

Josh Weinreb can be reached at jweinreb@vnews.com or 603-727-3306.