GENEVA, IL - The Wisconsin Timber Rattlers took an early lead, but the Kane County Cougars didn't care. The Cougars collected 16 hits and defeated the Rattlers 9-4 on Friday night at Northwestern Medicine Field.Jay Feliciano gave the Timber Rattlers (31-36) a 2-0 lead in the second inning with a
GENEVA, IL - The Wisconsin Timber Rattlers took an early lead, but the Kane County Cougars didn't care. The Cougars collected 16 hits and defeated the Rattlers 9-4 on Friday night at Northwestern Medicine Field.
Jay Feliciano gave the Timber Rattlers (31-36) a 2-0 lead in the second inning with a two-run homer to left.
The Cougars (33-34) rallied to tie the game in the bottom of the second. Wisconsin starter Bowden Francis retired the first two batters, but gave up a triple to Ryan Grotjohn. Tim Susnara followed with a home run to right and the game was tied 2-2.
Kane County took the lead in the bottom of the third with a pair of two-out RBI hits. Gabriel Maciel started the inning with a walk and he had moved to third base on a pair of infield grounders. Ernie De La Trinidad doubled down the line in left to send Maciel home. Then, Yan Sanchez hit a seeing-eye single to right to get De La Trinidad home for a 4-2 lead.
Yoel Yanqui continued to torment Wisconsin pitching when he cracked a two-out, two-run home run in the fifth inning to give the Cougars a 6-2 lead. Yanqui had three hits on Friday night and is 18-for-44 (.409) with eight RBI in eleven games against the Rattlers this season.
Wisconsin did rally and manage to knock Kane County starter Jhoan Duran out of the game in the sixth inning. Demi Orimoloye was hit by a pitch to start the inning and Trever Morrison followed with a single. Duran struck out the next two batters to give him nine strikeouts in the game, but walked Feliciano to load the bases and that ended his night.
Breckin Williams took over for Duran and forced in a run by walking Zach Clark. Williams retired the next batter with a strikeout to end the Rattlers threat.
The Cougars got that run back with an RBI single by Susnara in the bottom of the sixth and added another run to their total on a two-out, RBI single by Grotjohn in the seventh.
Gabriel García lined a solo home run to left in the top of the eighth for Wisconsin. It was his third home run of the season.
But, the Cougars added another run when Jasrado Chisholm doubled to left to score Jancarlos Cintron for a 9-4 lead and the game ended with that score after the Rattlers went down in order in the top of the ninth.
Kane County scored seven of their nine runs after there were two outs and went 7-for-15 with runners in scoring position.
The Timber Rattlers, who were 1-for-9 with runners in scoring position and struck out a total of 15 times on Friday night, are 2-9 in eleven games against the Cougars this season.
Game two of the series is scheduled for Saturday night. Nelson Hernández (7-3, 4.27) is the scheduled starting pitcher for the Timber Rattlers. Jeff Bain (5-1, 2.59) is set to start for the Cougars. Game time is 6:30pm. The radio broadcast is on AM1280, WNAM starting with the Potawatomi Hotel & Casino Pregame Show at 6:10pm. The broadcast is also available on the Tune In and IHeart Radio apps. Subscribers to MiLB.tv can watch the game over the internet.
