Dust Devils Rally Twice, Downed Late by Hops

The offense of the Tri-City Dust Devils (20-22) came to life Thursday night, rallying twice from multi-run deficits, but the Hillsboro Hops (18-24) scored late to grab a 7-6 win at Ron Tonkin Field.

The game began with both starters posting zeroes in the first two innings. Dust Devils righty Caden Dana had a stretch of four straight strikeouts to close the 1^st inning and start the 2^nd. Hops righty Dylan Ray also struck out four in his first six outs, including the side in the top of the 1^st. Neither would factor in the decision.

Tri-City opened the scoring in the top of the 3^rd. RF Osmy Gregorio doubled down the left field line to lead off the inning, moving to third on an infield single by CF D’Shawn Knowles. C Myles Emmerson then grounded into a double play, but Gregorio came home for a 1-0 Dust Devils lead.

The Hops then took advantage of three Dust Devil errors over a three-inning span, all coming with two outs and allowing runs to score. The defensive miscues allowed the Hops to grab a 4-1 lead through five innings.

Tri-City would make its first rally in the top of the 6^th, scoring three runs off Hillsboro debutant Logan Clayton to tie the game. Emmerson singled to right to lead off the inning. DH Joe Stewart would follow and do the same, moving Emmerson to third but getting caught off the first base bag and tagged out trying to return. 2B Adrian Placencia, though, would make sure Emmerson scored, doubling down the right field line to cut the Hillsboro lead to 4-2.

A wild pitch moved Placencia to third, and Matthews drew a walk to put runners on the corners. Blakely then executed a perfect bunt down the third base line, scoring Placencia for an RBI single and drawing the Dust Devils within a run at 4-3. The bunt moved Matthews to second, and a balk with Vera up moved him to third and Blakely to second. Vera then flew out deep enough to center to score Matthews and tie the game at 4-4.

The Hops answered quickly in the bottom of the 6^th. Mattis, Jr., sent a pitch from Tri-City reliever Nick Mondak over the left field fence to take the lead back at 5-4, and a sacrifice fly by Hillsboro 3B Jesus Valdez pushed the Hops advantage to 6-4.

The Dust Devils rallied a second time to tie the game in the top of the 8^th inning. Blakely came up with one out and hit a grounder to his counterpart Valdez, whose throw ran to the home plate side of first base for an error. Blakely then stole second and got to third when the throw to second rolled into center field, an error charged to Logan. Vera walked to put runners on the corners and Alexander Ramirez stepped in, grounding a ball to the right side. Chen made a diving stop and threw to first, retiring Ramirez but allowing Blakely to score to make it a 6-5 game.

There Tri-City’s seventh and eighth hitters in the lineup came through again, with Gregorio hitting a grounder off a pitch from Hillsboro reliever Eli Saul (1-0) that spun to a stop in fair territory down the third base line. The infield hit that moved Vera to third and brought Knowles to the plate, where he shot an opposite-field single to left to score Vera and tie the game at 6-6.

The Hops, though, had the final answer, amassing a two-out rally off Dust Devils stopper Nick Jones (1-3) to score what ended up the winning run on a double by 1B Ivan Melendez. Tri-City attempted one more rally, with Stewart singling to lead off the 9^th. The home team cut the rally down, though, picking Stewart off and getting the final two outs for the win.

At the plate the Dust Devils got multi-hit games from both Gregorio (3 for 4) and Knowles (2 for 3). The visiting nine will look to build on that performance in game four of the six-game series at 6:35 p.m. Friday night at Ron Tonkin Field. Tri-City will give right-hander Chase Chaney (2-1, 3.57 ERA) the start, and Hillsboro will counter with lefty Spencer Giesting (1-1, 3.33 ERA).

Broadcast coverage of the game begins with the pregame show at 6:15 p.m. both here and at the MiLB First Pitch app.

Tri-City and Hillsboro will play earlier over the weekend, with a 4:05 p.m. start Saturday and a 1:05 p.m. matinee Sunday. The Dust Devils then return home for a six-game series with the Spokane Indians from May 30-June 4.

Tickets for the Spokane series, including the June 2-4 return of the Columbia River Rooster Tails, are on sale now. Also, special ticket rates are available for groups of 20 or more. For more information on Dust Devils single game, season, mini-plan (11, 22, 33) and group tickets, visit dustdevilsbaseball.com, call the team office at (509) 544-8789, or visit the team office (10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on game nights, or Monday-Friday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. otherwise).