Following a rainout on Tuesday, Wednesday’s three-game series against the Hays Larks, the current NBC World Series Champions, was a doubleheader. The evening began with a pitching duel that led to a 4-1 Bee Jays victory. The second game ended in a 14-8 Lark victory owing to a late hitting frenzy. Brent Gould Field will decide the series on Thursday night. The final meeting between these two is scheduled for mid-July.
With a single run from Matt Bernath off of an RBI single by Carson Willis in the first inning, the Bee Jays took an early lead. In the top of the second, the Larks would respond with a run of their own, but the Bee Jays’ outstanding defensive performance prevented another run from being scored. After a triple by Thomas Lyssy led to a play at the plate that went in the Bee Jays’ favor in the second inning, the team would escape disaster. The Bee Jays added an out and stopped an extra run in the game’s pivotal moment when the throw from right field reached catcher Drew Garcia in time for an easy tag. Jason Davis, the starting pitcher, would complete the second inning with another strikeout after the relay and tag helped him leave the game with just one run on a sacrifice fly. In his final six innings, Davis allowed just one run on two hits while striking out six batters, including two in the sixth, and walking four and hitting one.
The Bee Jays would score two more runs in the sixth and another in the fourth. After driving in Jack Ryan with a single in the fourth inning, Bernath would add his own RBI. After catcher Drew Garcia hit a solo home run to begin the sixth inning, Jake Ortega doubled, allowing Jack Ryan to score his second run of the game and game-winning run. The Larks only managed one run on two hits and made one mistake, while the Bee Jays finished with four runs on seven hits.
Although the second game would begin similarly, it would pick up in the later innings for a more exciting finish. This time around, the Bee Jays scored two runs in the first inning, but that would be their final two-run total until a late-inning rally in the seventh inning proved to be too little, too late. The drought began when Todd Baffa and Drew Grego scored in the first inning. The Larks then retired nine consecutive batters over the next three innings and 18 batters in total over the five innings leading up to the final inning, when the drought ended.
A six-run seventh-inning rally wouldn’t have been enough to erase the 14-2 deficit they began the inning with, but an additional two innings might have changed the outcome. Following two scoreless innings against the Larks, the Bee Jays defense allowed three runs in each of the next two innings before giving up five runs in the fifth and three more in the seventh. In the last half inning, which featured a grand slam from Drew Grego on their way to six runs, the Bee Jay bats would come alive. The Larks’ consistency translated their 14 hits into 14 for a 14-8 victory, while the Bee Jays only scored eight runs in the bookend innings despite their 13 total hits in game two.
The Bee Jays had a good finish to an otherwise lopsided game, and they will want to maintain that momentum going into Thursday night’s final game of their three-game homestand against the Larks. The Bee Jays’ season record now stands at 8-7, and they are still.500 (7-7) in the Rocky Mountain League. Brent Gould Field will host the first pitch on Thursday night at 7 p.m.; it will be broadcast on the Home of Bee Jay Baseball KSCB 1270 AM, 92.3 FM. The buyout sponsor is Hat Creek Butchery.
