Late surge pushes Hops to victory
Chad Oberacker continued to tear the cover off the ball, picking up two hits and scoring a run, and the Hillsboro Hops defeated the Tri-City Dust Devils 6-2 Saturday night at Gesa Stadium to push the Dust Devils back into a tie atop the Northwest League North.
Playing in his third game for the Hops (18-18), Oberacker’s second hit was a game changer as he led off the top of the sixth with a double and eventually came around to score Hillsboro’s first run on a triple by Ramon Hernandez. Hillsboro took a 3-2 advantage in the frame and never looked back.
The Dust Devils (18-18) had a chance to extend their 2-0 lead in the fifth with runners at second and third and one out, but a strikeout by Buddy Reed and an infield pop up by Chris Baker prevented Tri-City from tacking on more runs. In the fourth, Baker smacked a double to right to score Reed and get the Dust Devils on the board.
In his fourth professional start, highly-touted prospect Joey Lucchesi was dealing once again. The left-hander allowed just two men to reach base and he struck out four Hops.
With the Spokane Indians beating the Boise Hawks on Saturday, the Dust Devils fell back into a tie for first in the NWL North with just two games to play until a first half champ is crowned. The Everett AquaSox are a game back.
Tri-City and Hillsboro will play thefourth installment of their five game set at 7:15 p.m. Sunday, then will conclude the first half schedule at the same time on Monday.
Hops 6, Dust Devils 2
Hillsboro ab | r | h | bi | Tri-City ab | r | h | bi | ||
Oberacker lf | 4 | 1 | 2 | 0 | Kohlwey rf | 4 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
Wilson cf | 4 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Reed cf | 4 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
R.Hrndz 3b | 5 | 1 | 1 | 2 | Baker ss | 4 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
Chigbogu 1b | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Young dh | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Lowery c | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Oversrt c | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
L.Veras rf | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | White 3b | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Owings dh | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | Easley 2b | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
Krviotis ss | 2 | 1 | 2 | 0 | Mattison 1b | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
A.Walton 2b | 3 | 0 | 1 | 1 | Burgos lf | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Totals 33 | 6 | 7 | 3 | Totals 31 | 2 | 4 | 2 | ||
Hillsboro | 000 | 003 | 210 | — | 6 |
Tri-City | 000 | 110 | 000 | — | 2 |
E—Erb (1). PB—Overstreet (5). DP—Hillsboro 1. LOB—Hillsboro 6, Tri-City 7. 2B—Oberacker (2), Baker (7). 3B— R. Hernandez (1). SB—Wilson (15), Owings (1), Baker (8). CS—Karaviotis (3). SAC—Walton.
Hillsboro | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO |
T.Simms | 4 1/3 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 4 |
Poche W, 1-1 | 1 2/3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
C.Taylor H, 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
J.Watson H, 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
Winston | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 |
Tri-City | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO |
Lucchesi | 3 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 |
Lorenzini | 3 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 3 | 6 |
Erb | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
Ford | 1 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
WP—Lucchesi, Lorenzini. B—Lucchesi. HBP—By Lorenzini (Karaviotis), By Simms (White). Umpires—H, Andrew Barrett; F, Darius Ghani . T—3:12. A—2,804.
This story was originally published July 24, 2016 at 1:35 PM with the headline "Late surge pushes Hops to victory."