C's Pitch Their Way To Doubleheader Sweep

VANCOUVER, BC – The Canadians used terrific pitching and just enough offense to win both games of a doubleheader against the Tri-City Dust Devils [Angels] Friday afternoon at Rogers Field at Nat Bailey Stadium.

Game 1 – Vancouver 1, Dust Devils 0 (7 innings)

With the game scoreless to start the bottom of the seventh, Estiven Machado worked a lead-off walk then Dasan Brown singled to put two aboard. A fly out moved Machado to third to set up Jace Bohrofen, whose Baltimore chop on the drawn-in infield was enough to score the winning run and put the C’s on top 1-0.

Starter Ryan Jennings and reliever Anders Tolhurst (W, 4-1) combined on a seven-inning shutout, with the former tossing five frames and the latter getting the last six outs.

Game 2 – Vancouver 4, Dust Devils 3 (7 innings)

The C’s grabbed an early lead in the top of the first to go in front for good. Dasan Brown walked then came all the way around to score an unearned run after a steal that featured a throwing error by the catcher and a misplay on the errant throw in centerfield.

A three-run fourth proved to be the difference. Vancouver’s first hit of the game came courtesy of a one-out solo shot by Nick Goodwin to make it 2-0 then the next four batters singled to bring home two more and put the Canadians ahead 4-0.

Chris McElvain (W, 3-2) was marvelous in arguably his finest turn of the year. The Thompson Station, TN native went six scoreless with two hits, five walks and six punchouts to record his second quality start of the season.

Tri-City made things interesting in the top of the seventh. After 23.2 consecutive scoreless innings – a Vancouver pitching staff team high this year – the Dust Devils rallied for three runs on three hits, but Grayson Thurman (S, 1) came on to douse the rally by stranding the tying run at third and the go-ahead run at first to secure the 4-3 win and a doubleheader sweep.

With the pair of wins, the C’s are now 22-23 and have leapfrogged Tri-City to take control of fourth place in the Northwest League standings. They are 4.5 games back of first place as of this writing with 19 games remaining in the first half.

The Canadians will look to earn a series win tomorrow afternoon as they become the Malmo Oat Milkers at 1:05 p.m. Catch RE/MAX Canadians Baseball on the C’s Broadcast Network: Sportsnet 650 and Bally Live.