Late Tri-City Comeback Undone by Walk-Off Homer

VANCOUVER, B.C. – Down 3-0 to the Vancouver Canadians (24-20 2H, 51-59) early on in Wednesday night’s contest at Rogers Field at Nat Bailey Stadium, the Tri-City Dust Devils (20-24 2H, 55-55) methodically made their way back to a tie game before Vancouver CF Jake Casey’s three-run walk-off homer in the bottom of the 9^th gave the hosts a 6-3 win.

Tri-City’s first run came with two outs in the top of the 3^rd when RF Jorge Ruiz smashed a gap double to right-center. DH Adrian Placencia, who had walked with one out, scored all the way from first to cut the deficit to two at 3-1. Neither team scored in the middle innings, with the Dust Devils getting great bullpen efforts both from lefty Francis Texido (2 IP, 0 H, 4 Ks) and righty Brady Stuart (1 perfect IP, 1 K in his professional debut).

In the 7^th inning the visitor got a run closer, beginning with C Peter Burns’s one-out single. Placencia drew another walk with two out, moving Burns to second and bringing up CF Gage Harrelson. The lefty hit a tough grounder to the right side of the infield, with the throw to get him wide of first and into the Tri-City dugout. Burns scored on the error, moving the Dust Devils within a run at 3-2.

The tie came in the 8^th inning, which started with a hustle double to the left-center gap by 3B David Mershon. 1B Ryan Nicholson came up and hit a hard grounder tracked down in shallow right field by Canadians 2B Ty Southisene. Mershon sprinted the entire way, sliding safely into home to bring things even at 3-3. Reliever Kyle Roche added two scoreless frames for Tri-City, getting things to the 9^th inning.

There the Dust Devils went down in order at the hand of Vancouver closer Jack Eshleman (2-1), giving the home team a chance to win the game in bottom of the 9^th. Righty Sam Tookoian (1-3), a Tri-City relief ace since joining the team a year ago, walked the first two batters he saw but rallied to strike out top Blue Jays prospect SS JoJo Parker. That brought Casey to the plate and the lefty got a hold of one, sending it deep over the wall in right to end the game.

DUST DEVILS NOTES

-Starter Dylan Jordan, in his second High-A start, struck out six in his three innings of work but walked five and hit a batter to run up his pitch count. Though giving up three runs in the bottom of the 2^nd on a couple of hits, Jordan rallied to post a scoreless third inning after his team had gotten on the board.

-Adrian Placencia walked three times on the night, producing the 11^th three-walk game of 2026 for the Dust Devils. The last four-walk games came in 2025, both drawn by Ryan Nicholson.

-The Canadians took the overall lead in the Second Half last night via the Hillsboro Hops’ 5-3 victory over the Eugene Emeralds at Hops Ballpark. The Everett AquaSox held off the Spokane Indians 6-5 at Everett Memorial Stadium, keeping Everett a game back of Vancouver in the playoff race. Spokane fell to 1.5 games back, with both Tri-City and Hillsboro four games back coming into Thursday night’s contest.

THURSDAY THE 13^TH

Tri-City and Vancouver collide in game three of their six-game series at 7:05 p.m. Thursday night at Rogers Field at Nat Bailey Stadium. Right-hander Yeferson Vargas (3-9, 6.10 ERA) heads to the hill for the Dust Devils, facing righty Dylan Watts (1-1, 7.88 ERA) of the Canadians.

Free broadcast coverage on the MiLB app and dustdevilsbaseball.com will begin Tuesday night with the Dust Devils Pregame Show at 6:45 p.m. Fans can also watch the game for free on Bally Sports Live (Vancouver broadcast), and via subscription on MLB.tv and the MiLB app.

Tri-City comes back after the week abroad to host the Everett AquaSox for a six-game set beginning Tuesday, August 18. For tickets to the Everett series, as well as all 2026 Dust Devils home games, visit the official ticket site, dustdevilsbaseball.com.