St. Cloud, MN — The Rox muscled their way to their 3rd straight win thanks to another impressive pitching performance from the Rox staff led by starter Carlo Graffeo (Southeastern Louisiana). In 6 innings, he kept Stingers batters silent, giving up just 3 hits and 1 run while fanning 7. After a 1st inning where he needed 25 pitches to get through it, he settled in after that and went to work. Ivan Coutinho (Bethune-Cookman) and Jackson Rose (Minnesota) pitched the 7th and 8th respectively, and set up Brent Killam (Georgetown) with the 3-1 lead. The freshman earned his 3rd save of the year, and struck out the final batter en route to St. Cloud's 16th win on the year.

After collecting 28 hits in two games in Bismarck, the Rox only had 5 Wednesday night. It didn't matter because the pitching was on its A game, and proved to opponents again how good they can be. Tonight marked the 9th time this season where STC has allowed 1 run or less to an opponent.

Matt Tarantino (Pacific) once again led the offense, going 2-2 with a walk and run scored. His hitting streak has now reached 9 games and in 6 of those he registered multiple hits.

Oddly enough, the Rox started the 1st well again. Well, that wasn't odd but the way they did could provoke somebody to scratch their head. St. Cloud scored two runs but didn't register a hit in the inning. Drew Avans (Southeastern Louisiana) was hit by a pitch, and then stole his 11th base of the season. Then scored after a sacrifice fly from Keaton Kringlen (BYU). The other run scored by Tarantino came after a wild pitch from the Willmar starter who didn't make it out of the 1st inning. 

The Rox added their only other run after Kringlen hit into a groundout in the 3rd that scored Avans. The quartet of Rox pitchers did enough though, and led the way after the offense paced STC yesterday.

St. Cloud now hits the road for the next few days with a game in Willmar tomorrow night at 7:05 PM. Then it's a trip to Thunder Bay for two days capped off by a road game at Mayo Field in Rochester. The Rox return to Faber Field Monday night against the Honkers for Faith in Action Night. There will be a pregame youth baseball and softball clinic presented by the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, YMCA and Northland Capital Financial Services.

Tonight's Box Score.

Northwoods League Standings.

Tonight's St. Cloud Times Player of the Night is Carlo Graffeo. He picked up his 1st win of the year after going 6 innings and allowing just 3 hits. 

The St. Cloud Rox are a member of the finest developmental league for elite college baseball players, the Northwoods League. The 23-year-old summer collegiate league is the largest organized baseball league in the world with 20 teams, drawing significantly more fans, in a friendly ballpark experience, than any league of its kind. A valuable training ground for coaches, umpires and front office staff, more than 170 former Northwoods League players have advanced to Major League Baseball, including two- time Cy Young Award winner Max Scherzer (WAS), two-time World Series Champion Ben Zobrist (CHC) and MLB All-Stars Chris Sale (BOS), Jordan Zimmermann (DET), Curtis Granderson (NYM) and Lucas Duda (NYM). All league games are viewable live via the Northwoods League portal. For more information, visit www.stcloudrox.com or download the new Northwoods League Mobile App on the Apple App Store or on Google Play and set the Rox as your favorite team.