Naturals Rally From Behind, Beat Riders 9-4

Friday night Northwest Arkansas took the field under their Copa identity, Los Naturales del Noroeste De Arkansas. The team wore special jerseys and hats to celebrate the Latin heritage in the community of Springdale and the entire Northwest Arkansas region.

Heading into Friday's game, the Naturals had lost their last four including the first three games of this week's series to the Frisco RoughRiders and had fallen to 6.5 games back of the final North Division playoff spot. In the fourth game of the series, Northwest Arkansas earned a big win complete with a stellar bullpen effort, another solid start from Steven Zobac, and a resilient performance from the offense to come back after trailing early.

Steven Zobac had won all five of his starts in August and led the league in the category for the month. The righty let up two runs in each of the first two opening frames with NWA trailing 4-0 through two.

While the righty navigated a high pitch count through the first couple of innings, the Naturals offense fired up in the bottom of the third. Jack Pineda struck out to start the inning but reached on a wild pitch. Javier Vaz walked and Tyler Tolbert wasted no time driving them in, doubling to left on the first pitch he saw to make it a two-run game. Josh Lester followed up on the very next pitch with a single to center, cutting the Frisco lead to one. Luca Tresh ripped a double to left, bringing Lester around to tie the game.

While Zobac settled in and held the Riders to their four runs through the fifth, Tolbert kicked off the fifth inning with his second double. Lester singled to right again and Tolbert raced home, giving the Naturals their first lead of the night, 5-4. Tresh walked and Peyton Wilson grounded into a force-out, moving both runners into scoring position.

That chased Frisco starter Nick Krauth from the game and his replacement, Bryan Chi, gave up a single to River Town on his first pitch of the night, bringing in Lester to extend the lead to 6-4.

Chase Wallace and Keylan Killgore combined to retire 12-straight RoughRiders out of the bullpen while NWA added three more runs in the eighth with Tolbert collecting his third double of the night and third RBI and River Town singling home two more runs in a three-hit night for him.

The Naturals and RoughRiders continue their series on Saturday night with a 6:05 PM CT first pitch as RHP Ben Kudrna takes the mound for NWA. Fans can catch all of the action with the "Voice of the Naturals", Shawn Murnin, on the free Bally Live app, MiLB.tv, the MiLB app, and nwanaturals.com. Fans can get their tickets at www.nwanaturals.com.