Extra-base Hits Drive in All Runs in 6-1 Win

Hillcats use multiple homers and a triple to fuel offense

(Lindsay Carico)

May 3, 2017

Brock Hartson went 6 2/3 innings and tied a career high with seven strikeouts to earn the win in his first start of the year. Meanwhile, the Lynchburg offense used six extra-base hits, including a pair of home runs, to take the rubber match against Winston-Salem Wednesday afternoon, 6-1.

Brock Hartson went 6 2/3 innings and tied a career high with seven strikeouts to earn the win in his first start of the year. Meanwhile, the Lynchburg offense used six extra-base hits, including a pair of home runs, to take the rubber match against Winston-Salem Wednesday afternoon, 6-1.

Hartson (1-0) held the Dash to one run on five hits, all of which were singles. The right-hander's previous career-long outing was six innings, which he had accomplished six times. Hartson needed just 87 pitches for his 6 2/3 frames Wednesday. Paul Hendrix took over for him and went 1 1/3 scoreless innings with a pair of strikeouts. Argenis Angulo struck out one as part of a perfect ninth inning.
Ivan Castillo drove in the first two runs of the contest with a triple into the right-field corner. That brought home Yonathan Mendoza andClaudio Bautista, who had singled and walked, respectively. Winston-Salem's lone run occurred on an RBI single by Danny Mendick in the fifth to cut the Hillcats lead in half, 2-1.
In the bottom of the fifth, Andrew Calica singled and stole second base. Two batters later, Ka'ai Tom hit his first home run as a Hillcat over the right field fence to make it 4-1. In the seventh inning, Calica decided to follow suit with a solo homer to right field to stretch it to 5-1. Lynchburg's final run happened after back-to-back doubles by Tom and Martin Cervenka to lead off the eighth.
Tom leads the Hillcats with 13 RBIs after racking up eight of them during the six-game homestand in which he went 9-20 (.450) and scored six runs. Tom has raised his season batting average to .304 over the last week. Cervenka is second on the squad with 11 RBIs and owns an identical .304 average.
The six extra-base hits marked a season high for Lynchburg, and it represented the fifth time the Hillcats have hit multiple home runs in the same game.
Lynchburg travels to Potomac for the first time in 2017 to begin a four-game series Thursday at 7:05 p.m. Shao-Ching Chiang (3-1, 1.71) has gone seven innings in each of his last three starts, winning all of them. The game can be heard live at www.lynchburg-hillcats.com.