They did it.

Somehow the 28 teams in the R.I. Interscholastic League's Division I baseball circuit defied the unpredictable New England springtime weather and completed their 18-game regular season schedules by last night so they can start the playoffs on Tuesday.

Last year the regular season didn't finish until June 1 and they didn't play the final game of the Division I state tournament until June 21. This year the final three days of the state tourney are scheduled for June 2-4 at McCoy Stadium.

To make, what could be the earliest finish ever to a Rhode Island high school baseball season, possible Interscholastic League officials moved move up the start of the season a week to the first week of April.

Eighteen games in seven weeks in a state where it rains an average of 11 days per month in the months of April and May is defying the odds, but somehow it worked.

In the past few weeks, as teams squeezed in rescheduled games, it wasn't uncommon to see a team's number-four pitcher in a starting role. Several teams played six games in the first 14 days of this month and some of those days they couldn't play because of rain. There were a few warm, sunny days, but there were many more chilly, damp afternoons.

But by yesterday afternoon they had the 24 qualifiers for the four, six-team double elimination regional tournaments that are the first step in the Division I tournament.

It's a credit to the fortitude of the state's high school baseball players as well as their baseball skills.

Don't fear the rain

Division II will try to finalize its playoff picture today and tomorrow, but if even rain forces some postponements, there is a little more time for rescheduling because its the 16-team Division II tourney is not scheduled to begin until Thursday.

Top-four Division I seeds set

When everything was settled yesterday Portsmouth, Hendricken, North Kingstown and Lincoln were holding the top four seeds respectively for the Division I tourney so the Patriots, Hawks, Skippers and Lions will be the top-seeded teams in the four regional tournaments.

Portsmouth earned the top seed with a 17-1 regular season mark and Hendricken took the number-two spot with a 15-2 mark. North Kingstown, South Kingstown and Cranston West tied for the third-best record with 15-3 marks but under Interscholastic League rules the champion in each of the four regular season subdivisions must be the top four seeded teams in the state tournament. Consequently only one of those three teams could earn a top-four seeding while Lincoln, whose 13-5 record was the best mark in the I-North subdivision, earned the No. 4 seed.

North Kingstown and South Kingstown tied for the I-South regular season crown and the Skippers and Rebels split their two regular season meetings. But North Kingstown took the I-South top seed on the strength of a better record against I-South competition.

That left South Kingstown and Cranston West, which played in I-West with Hendricken, deadlocked for the No. 5 seed and South Kingstown took the spot on the strength of its victory over the Falcons in their regular-season meeting.

The top eight seeds receive byes in the opening round of the regional tournaments and Moses Brown and La Salle earned the right to sit out the first round as the Quakers and Rams finished with the seventh best records at 12-6.

The other 16 teams who qualified for the Division I playoffs are Cranston East, North Providence, Narragansett, Chariho, St. Raphael, Cumberland, Coventry, Woonsocket, Tiverton, Smithfield, Barrington, East Greenwich, Middletown, East Providence, Toll Gate and Pilgrim.

Westmoreland's power surge

The fans - and pro scouts - who were at Moses Brown on Tuesday afternoon to see Portsmouth's Ryan Westmoreland in one of his few regular-season appearances in the metro-Providence area didn't have to wait long for some excitement.

Westmoreland made two plate appearances in the top of the first inning and blasted a home run each time. The two home runs were part of a 10-run first-inning explosion that started Portsmouth on the way to an eventual 18-9 victory.

Apparently Westmoreland isn't just impressing the fans and scouts with his play this spring. Moses Brown athletic director Jeff Maidment was so impressed with the magnitude of the blast over the right-center field fence that Westmoreland hit for his first home run after the game Merriman took his measuring wheel and rolled it from home plate to the spot where the ball first hit the ground. The blast measured 485 feet.

Portsmouth hits stride

This season's 17-1 record means in its first two years of Division I play Portsmouth compiled a combined 35-1 record in regular season play. Last year, Portsmouth's first in Division I, the Patriots posted a perfect 18-0 regular-season mark.

'Bolts hand Meo 1st loss

Cranston East made a strong bid for one of the top eight Division I seeds Monday night when the Thunderbolts handed Cranston West All-State pitcher Anthony Meo the first loss of his high school career with a 4-3 victory at Cranston Stadium.

But then Cranston East lost to Coventry on Tuesday and dropped a 9-2 decision to Cranston West in the second edition of their intra-city rivalry yesterday. Those two setbacks dropped the Thunderbolts' record to 11-7, which means they their will be the tournament's ninth seed and will play a first-round game.

Stars set to shine

The annual Coaches All-Star games will be played tomorrow at McCarthy Field in West Warwick. The three games, which are slated for 10 a.m., 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. will include players from both Division I and II.