Rancho Rallies, But Falls Late

Rancho Cucamonga, CA – Modesto’s Noelvi Marte smashed a pair of homers and drove in the game-winning run, as the Nuts sent Rancho Cucamonga to their second straight home loss, defeating the Quakes by a final of 9-8 on Thursday night at LoanMart Field.

Marte finished with three hits and four RBIs, but his biggest hit was a tie-breaking two-out single off of Cameron Gibbens that gave the Nuts the lead for good in the eighth.

Trailing 9-8 in the last of the eighth, the Quakes threatened, as Brandon Wulff reached on an error, moved to second on a balk, then advanced to third on a wild pitch. But with two outs, Jake Vogel went down on strikes against Luis Curvelo. In the ninth, Rancho went in order, as Curvelo notched his second save.

The Quakes rallied from an early 5-1 deficit, as they chipped away with two in the second, two in the fifth and three more to get even in the sixth. Jorbit Vivas (2) and Johnny DeLuca (1) both went yard for Rancho to help aid the come-back.

Starter Jimmy Lewis got roughed up for five runs over just two innings in his second start of the year.

Rancho reliever Hyun-Il Choi (0-1) suffered the loss, as he allowed three runs over 3.1 innings.

Modesto reliever Nolan Hoffman (1-0) earned the victory with a scoreless seventh.

Rancho (4-4) will send Braydon Fisher (0-0) to the hill against Taylor Dollard (0-0) on Friday night, with first pitch scheduled for 6:30pm. Limited tickets are available for Friday’s game at rcquakes.com. We hope to see you at LoanMart Field very soon!