Wausau, WI–After a rainy, disappointing Saturday night in Wausau, the Lakeshore Chinooks bounced back in a big way during their Sunday matinee at Athletic Park, taking down the Wisconsin Woodchucks 7-4.
For the first time since Thursday, the offense didn’t explode in the early innings. On Friday and Saturday, the bats combined for nine runs in the first two innings. In fact, it was Wisconsin that jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the second inning after a Nick Loftin lead-off triple that came around to score thanks to an Alex Toral RBI single.
But Lakeshore responded in the middle innings.
Turner Buis led-off the fourth inning by walloping the first pitch he saw over the wall in right field, and the Chinooks offense took that momentum and ran with it.
Dallas Beaver walked, then Jim Govern, Griffin Day and Ronald Sweeny III all singled. When the dust settled, the Chinooks hung a 4 on the scoreboard that couldn’t be matched by the ‘Chucks bats.
Lakeshore added more insurance in the fifth. Back-to-back walks to Jack Dunn and Christian Boulware set the table for Jim Govern who delivered with an error-aided two-run single.
After the initial trouble, Chinooks starter Nate Odhal settled down and settled in with a nice start.
It was an important outing for the Carthage righty after he suffered his second straight loss during his last start against Kalamazoo June 17th, surrendering a season-high five earned runs through a season-low 1.2 innings pitched.
Then, his last start was canceled thanks to the torrential rain showers that hit Kenosha earlier this week.
But today in Wausau, Odahl was back to his old self. The trusty right arm that had derived three starts of five innings with three combined earned runs.
He ended his day in Wausau with a final line of five innings, five hits, one earned run and three strikeouts.
Lakeshore added one more insurance run in the seventh thanks to a Dey double and a Sweeney III RBI single.
Even with a 7-1 lead heading into the bottom of the eighth, Lakeshore was sweating out the win down the stretch.
Wisconsin plated two in the eighth via two hits, two walks and a wild pitch.
Then, in the ninth, with the score 7-3, the Woodchucks loaded the bases and set the stage for a mano-a-mano between Chinooks reliever Marko Boricich and ‘Chucks clean-up man Javier Valdez.
Valez had been in this same situation before. In fact, on Father’s day, he sent the Woodchucks faithful home happy with a walk-off grand slam. But Boricich didn’t let lightning strike twice. He got Valdez on a bender to end it.
Lakeshore returns home tomorrow to face Kenosha. Austin Jones takes the mound for a 1:35 start.
