The Tri-City Dust Devils won a nail-biter, defeating the Hops 4-3 Tuesday night at Gesa Stadium.Kevin McCanna suffered his first loss as a Hop, but maintained his 0.00 ERA, allowing one unearned run in five innings of relief, with six strikeouts and two bases on balls. McCanna's throwing error in
The Tri-City Dust Devils won a nail-biter, defeating the Hops 4-3 Tuesday night at Gesa Stadium.
Kevin McCanna suffered his first loss as a Hop, but maintained his 0.00 ERA, allowing one unearned run in five innings of relief, with six strikeouts and two bases on balls. McCanna's throwing error in the sixth inning set up the go-ahead run, which scored on Justin Lopez's two-out infield hit. Lopez plated fellow 17-year-old infielder Luis Almanzar, who had singled to lead off the inning. They are the two youngest players in the Northwest League.
The Hops were held to three hits for the second consecutive night, but were right with Tri-City throughout and had multiple chances to tie the game late. The Hops had just 22 hits in the five-game series, dropping four of five games against a team with the lowest team ERA in the league entering the series.
Elias Torres pitched two innings of relief to earn the win, allowing one unearned run when the Hops tied the game 3-3 on Pavin Smith's two-out RBI single up the middle in the fifth inning.
Tri-City starting pitcher Aaron Leasher, making his NWL debut, went four innings, walking five batters with three strikeouts. Leasher allowed only one hit, but two of the walks came in to score on a Ryan Grotjohn single and Camden Duzenack sacrifice fly in the second inning.
The Hops led 2-1 briefly before Tri-City countered with two runs in the bottom of the second. Hops starting pitcher Brian Shaffer faced two batters in the second, departing after throwing 48 pitches and allowing four hits. Jose Lezama greeted McCanna with an RBI single and Tyler Benson drove in a run with a sac fly. Lezama was thrown out by center fielder Tra Holmes trying to score on Lopez's base hit, leaving Tri-City in front 3-2.
Trevor Megill earned the save, but a throwing error by shortstop Almanzar put Bryan Araiza on base. Araiza stole second and advanced to third base when catcher Jose Lezama's throw sailed into center field. With the tying run at third, Megill got Luis Lara to foul out to third base to end the game, earning his first save.
The Hops open a three-game series at Ron Tonkin Field against the Eugene Emeralds Wednesday night. Live coverage begins with the pregame show at 6:35 p.m. on Rip City Radio 620 AM. First pitch is at 7:05 p.m.
