One Run Decides Two On Saturday Night

INDIANAPOLIS – The Omaha Storm Chasers took a series lead with a sweep of the Indianapolis Indians in Saturday night’s doubleheader, 2-1 and 4-3. All five contests played so far in the six-game series have been decided by one run.

The pair of losses marked Omaha’s fifth sweep of Indianapolis in a doubleheader dating back to 1988. In twin bills against Omaha, the Indians are now 9-17 with three Omaha sweeps coming in the Circle City. They were last swept in a doubleheader at Victory Field on Aug. 16, 2019 against Lehigh Valley.

The Indians (31-32) were narrowly edged by the Storm Chasers in Game 1, 2-1. Each team tallied four hits, with Omaha’s pair of home runs by Ryan McBroom and Anderson Miller being the difference.

Southpaw Steven Brault (L, 0-1) made his first rehab start with the Indians and gave up one run – McBroom’s solo homer in the second inning – on two hits. He also struck out two batters with no walks in his three innings. Meanwhile, Jackson Kowar (W, 6-2) fanned eight Indy hitters in five two-hit innings.

In the nightcap, Omaha (40-23) put up four runs in the fourth inning and held off an Indians seventh-inning comeback effort for the win.

Bligh Madris plated the first run of the game with a sacrifice fly off Eddie Butler (W, 4-1) to score Dee Strange-Gordon in the bottom of the first inning. The Indians had multiple runners on base with no outs to open the first two innings, but only walked away with a single run.

The Storm Chasers, after stranding six runners of their own against Beau Sulser (L, 4-3) in the first three innings, came up big in the fourth. Miller launched his second home run of the night, this time with a pair of runners on base, to take a 3-0 lead. Edward Olivares then scored the eventual game-winning run on a wild pitch.

A leadoff walk to T.J. Rivera in the bottom of the seventh inning began the Indians rally. With two outs, Dee-Strange Gordon singled and Anthony Alford doubled to put the tying runners in scoring position. Strange-Gordon scored on a wild pitch, but Alford was stranded 90 feet away in the narrow loss.

The Indians will go for the series tie against the Triple-A East Midwest Division leaders on Sunday at 1:35 PM ET. In a rematch of the series opener, RHP Mitch Keller (1-0, 1.80) will face off against LHP Marcelo Martinez (1-3, 5.40).