Hot Bats Carry Crawdads to 10-7 Victory
Hickory, NC - The hot hitting Hickory Crawdads rode their offense to another win Saturday night, as the 'Dads bats drove in 10 runs on 14 hits to carry the club to a 10-7 win over the Hagerstown Suns.
The offensive output marked the fourth straight game the Hickory hitters collected double digit hits and the second consecutive night that that all nine batters finished with at least one base knock. Jose Cardona paced the attack with a 3-5 game including a triple, an RBI, and a run scored, while Eduard Pinto reached base safely four times with a 2-3 night including two walks, an RBI, and a run.
Juremi Profar and Xavier Turner provided the pop, with Profar going 2-4 with a home run, two runs scored and an RBI and Turner finishing 1-4 with a homer and 2 RBI.
It was the Suns that jumped out to the initial lead, with a leadoff triple and an RBI groundout putting Hagerstown up 1-0 in the 1st. The Crawdads responded with a game-tying run in the 2nd thanks to a solo homer to left by Profar that deadlocked the score at 1-1.
Hagerstown came back with another tally on an RBI single by Jose Marmolejos in the 3rd, but the 'Dads quickly rallied with 5 runs in the bottom of the inning to take a 6-2 advantage. Josh Morgan started the rally with a leadoff walk, before Pinto singled and Jose Trevino drove in a run on an RBI base knock to left. A wild pitch, an RBI double by Jairo Beras, and a 2-run blast from Turner plated the other four runs to put Hickory ahead by four.
The Suns battled back with an RBI sacrifice by Dale Carey in the 4th followed by an RBI groundout from Marmolejos and an RBI single by Raudy Reed in the 5th to narrow the score to 6-5.
The Crawdads bats came back with another big inning in the 6th however, with the club plating 4 runs on six hits to push their lead to 10-5. The first five batters of the inning came through with a hit, including a leadoff single by Profar, an RBI double from Chuck Moorman, an RBI triple by Cardona, an RBI double from Morgan, and an RBI base knock by Pinto to push the 'Dads ahead by five.
Hagerstown scored once in the 7th and one last run in the 9th before Kelvin Vasquez finished off the game for a 10-7 Hickory victory.
'Dads starter Collin Wiles (10-3) earned the win with five runs allowed on 10 hits, no walks and a strikeout over 5 innings pitched. Hagerstown starter Luis Reyes (5-7) was handed the loss after giving up six runs on 7 hits, two walks, and one K over 3 IP.
The Crawdads (64-39/20-15) will go for the series win over the Suns (50-53/15-20) in the finale Sunday evening, with first pitch scheduled for 5:00 pm.
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