Cubs sweep Miracle, win 5th straight

Daytona Beach, FL The Daytona Cubs won their fifth-straight and seventh out of their last eight games after an 8-2 victory over the Ft. Myers Miracle on Thursday evening at Jackie Robinson Ballpark.

In his first at-bat in the Chicago Cubs organization since being traded from the Texas Rangers on July 31, 3B Christian Villanueva crushed a solo homerun over the batting cages beyond the left field fence to give the Cubs a 1-0 lead.

With the game tied 1-1 in the third, 2B Roni Torreyes hit a two-run homerun, his sixth of the season, to put the Cubs up 3-1. On the next pitch, Villanueva, again, belted a homerun over the batting cages giving him two longballs in his first two plate appearances as a Daytona Cub.

RHP Rob Whitenack, despite some second inning control issues, allowed one run on two hits over 3.2 innings of work.

RHP Ryan Searle worked also allowed one run in 3.1 inning of relief with five strikeouts, and RHP A.J. Morris finished the game with two shutout innings. Searle and Morris were the only two Cubs relief pitchers available.

Leading 4-2, the Cubs added two runs in both the fifth and sixth innings to extend their lead to 8-2.

Five Daytona players had multi-hit games, including Torreyes who produced his sixth-straight. Torreyes has raised his batting average to .274. LF John Andreoli, RF Elieser Bonne and SS Tim Saunders were the other three with two hits. Bonne, Saunders and C Rafael Lopez stole bases as well.

With the win, the Cubs improve to 50-59 on the season and 20-21 in the second half. Daytona will begin a three-game series in Dunedin on Friday, with first pitch on Friday scheduled for 6:30p.m.