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Published On: July 25th, 2017

 

Mequon, WI- The Lakeshore Chinooks (10-7) defeated the Kalamazoo Growlers on Monday night, 2-1. The Chinooks were led by six solid innings from starter, Austin Havekost (Kent State).

The Chinooks would break the scoreless tie in the bottom of the 3rd inning, thanks to a Joe Duncan (Eastern Illinois) RBI single that brought home Jack Dunn (Northwestern) after he led off the inning with a walk, giving the Chinooks the 1-0 advantage.

Joe Duncan would build off his RBI single in the 3rd inning, as he plated Drake Lubin on his second RBI single of the game, this time in the bottom of the 5th. The base knock gave Lakeshore a 2-0 lead.

Kalamazoo went all the way to the 7th inning without cracking the scoreboard, as a costly error from Lakeshore in the top of the 7th gave the Growlers their first run. Chinooks’ Josh Serio (UW-Milwaukee) fielded a bunt attempt from Ryan Orr, but threw the ball wildly to 1st base, allowing Jeff Riedel to come around and score, as Kalamazoo trailed by just a run.

Chinooks’ starter Austin Havekost was stellar in the ballgame, shutting out the Growlers over six innings, allowing just two hits and four walks, while striking out five.

The start marked Havekost’s fourth straight pitching at least six innings while allowing one earned run or fewer.

Over his last 26 innings pitched, Havekost has allowed a ridiculous three earned runs, which calculates to a 1.04 ERA.

When asked about his start, Havekost said he felt good. “You know, I haven’t thrown in a while, so I knew I was gonna be a little rusty when I went out, so I just tried to get ahead, throw strikes, and let these awesome guys behind me do their job.”

Over Havekost’s last four strong starts, he credits his defense for a majority of his success. “Honestly, I’m just using my defense. Everyone can hit a fastball in this league, so have an off-speed, make sure you hit your spots early, that helps a lot.”

Havekost also has his college battery mate, Tim DalPorto (Kent State), catching for him now with the Chinooks. Havekost said about DalPorto, “Me and Tim are with each other every day, spending time, getting to know each other, and we’re pretty comfortable.”

The bullpen of the Chinooks was also very good in this one, as a combination of Josh Serio, Joe Heineman (Baylor), and Nick Campe (Olivet Nazarene) allowed just one run over three innings to secure the 2-1 victory.

The Lakeshore Chinooks (10-7) will again face off with the Kalamazoo Growlers on Tuesday night at 6:35, with Aaron Winkler (Richmond) making his first start of the summer for the Chinooks as Lakeshore looks to complete the 2-game sweep of Kalamazoo.

The Lakeshore Chinooks 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 180 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.lakeshorechinooks.com or download the new Northwoods League Mobile App on the Apple App Store or on Google Play and set the Chinooks as your favorite team.