Los Guerreros End Final Saturday on Wagner Walk Off

FAYETTEVILLE, NC - Down to his final strike in the tenth, Will Wagner delivered the walk-off swing in extra innings as the Los Guerreros de Fayetteville (54-64) won 2-1 over the Carolina Mudcats (67-51) on the final Saturday night of the regular season at Segra Stadium. The walk off was the sixth this year for Fayetteville and closed another three-hit performance from Wagner.

Rhett Kouba made his third start of the year and retired the side in order in the first thanks to a pair of strikeouts. He returned to work the second, recording an out before the game entered a rain delay. After a 34-minute delay, Kouba returned and allowed a double to Hedbert Perez. Andre Nnebe followed with a liner to short that was grabbed on a dive by Stevens and turned into an inning-ending double play with Perez caught off the bag.

Quincy Hamilton opened the scoring in the second with a leadoff home run against Zach Mort, his second of the season and second in three days. Off the heels of the home run, Hamilton contributed on the defensive side with a diving catch in the third inning to take a hit away from Zack Raabe.

With a 1-0 lead, Alex Palmer made his Woodpeckers debut in the fourth. He struck out the first batter he faced which started a stretch of 10 straight hitters set down. Tyler Black broke up the perfect outing with an RBI single in the seventh that tied the game 1-1.

Palmer tossed a scoreless eighth, ending his debut with eight strikeouts over five innings, while issuing no walks.

Jacob Delabio emerged from the bullpen in the ninth and issued two straight walks. A fielder’s choice from Alex Binelas put runners on the corners with one out. After striking out Black, Delabio issued another walk to Micah Bello to load up the bases. With the pressure on, Perez drove a high fly to center that was tracked down by Hamilton to keep the game tied. James Meeker (L, 1-2) recorded the final out of the eighth for Carolina and rolled through the ninth, striking out the Woodpeckers side in order.

Ronny Garcia (W, 1-1) took to the mound in the tenth and inherited pinch-runner Noah Campbell on second base. Hamilton made another great sliding catch in center field to take a hit away from Nnebe, Jose Sibrian struck out looking, and Raabe grounded out to third stranding the free runner.

In the bottom of the 10th, Meeker returned to the mound with Kobe Kato as the base runner at second. He advanced to third on a groundout by Michael Sandle. After pinch-hitter Justin Williams struck out swinging, Wagner connected with the go-ahead single on a roller towards the middle of the diamond. The ball kicked off of Raabe’s glove as Kato crossed the plate to walk it off for Fayetteville 2-1.

The season concludes tomorrow with first pitch scheduled for 2:00 p.m. E.T. Fayetteville will roll out RHP Carlos Calderon (2-1, 5.40) and the Mudcats will counter with RHP Alexander Cornielle (0-1, 10.13).

FULL BOX SCORE: Mudcats 1, Woodpeckers 2 (Final Score) on Gameday (milb.com)