By Sedric Granger<\/b><\/p>\n
Battle Creek, MI – The Kalamazoo Growlers (27-15) defeated the Battle Creek Battle Jacks (15-28), 4-2, handing the Jacks their 3rd straight defeat.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Throughout the first five innings, the eighth round of the I-94 Rivalry played out in a back-and-forth manner. Although the Growlers took the lead initially in the top of the third, the Dogs answered with both a Luke Cheng (Illinois State) RBI single scoring Nikolas Clark (Davenport University) and a Brock Daniels (University of Missouri) RBI fielder\u2019s choice scoring Jt Sokolove (Illinois State). In the top of the 5th inning, Kalamazoo took the lead back with a two-run frame for the third and final lead change of the matchup. The Battle Jacks were not able to recover after that.<\/span><\/p>\n Defensively, after giving up 17 runs yesterday, the Battle Jacks defense made some great plays to keep the Growlers relatively at bay. Jacob Davis (Kalamazoo College) got the start and had Battle Creek in position to win when he exited the game with an injury in the top of the 4th inning. As a result of the early exit by Davis, Jake Kampf (SIUE)was forced into the game earlier than expected. Despite that factor, Kampf delivered three and one thirds innings of work out of the bullpen with two earned runs allowed. Unfortunately for the Battle Jacks, the run support was not there to compensate for the runs given up. Brandon Markarian (University of Indianapolis) pitched the final two and two thirds innings for the Jacks and gave up just one earned run in that span. Battle Creek\u2019s defense made some big plays behind the pitchers as well including two double plays and a ridiculous diving catch by Jake Allgeyer where he tripped over the mound and still brought the baseball into his glove.<\/span><\/p>\n Once again, the big struggle for the Battle Jacks offense today was the inability to push opposing teams into their bullpens. For the third time in their last five home games, Battle Creek fell victim to an opposing starting pitcher going for eight innings. In this game, Eamon Horwedel (University of Michigan) delivered eight solid innings of work, yielding only two earned runs. This start made it easy pickings for Kalamazoo\u2019s closing pitcher to earn the save. The Blue and White will need to improve at driving up the pitch count in their plate appearances.<\/span><\/p>\n