The Lakeshore Chinooks concluded their season with a game against the Fond Du Lac Dock Spiders. After a long season in the hot summer, Lakeshore wrapped their season up at their home ballpark of Moonlight Graham Field. Of Course, this one had its ups and downs like any season. So how did the Chinooks finish in their last game of the season? Well, after battling for nine innings, in their last match of the season, the Chinooks lost a close one with the final score being 6-5.

 

Fond Du Lac got to work early, scoring in the first inning. Jake Surane got to first with a single and advanced to third off two consecutive walks. Eventually, a wild pitch by Chinooks starter Gradin Taschner allowed Surane to make his way home for a Dock Spiders 1-0 lead. Fond Du Lac cashed in another three runs in the inning. One of them came via an RBI sac fly from Paul Wittman that gave the Dock Spiders a 2-0 lead. When all was said and done, the Chinooks were down 4-0 after one half-inning. 

 

Lakeshore got two of those runs back in the bottom first. The first Chinook run came when Will Johannes’s RBI single drove in Roessler. Roessler got on base with a single and made his way to second off an error on the throw to first. With one out, the Chinooks had the bases loaded with Jack Counsell on third, Johannes on second, and Adam Cootway on first.  Counsell scored an unearned run off an error, and the Chinooks had cut the deficit in half. 

 

Zach Slome replaced Taschner on the mound to start the second inning after Taschner threw 35 pitches in the first.  Slome shut down the Dock Spiders in the second inning but couldn’t hold them off in the third. Paul Wittman got his second RBI of the night with an RBI single that sent home Parker Knoll, who got on base after a pitch hit him. At the end of the top third, the Chinooks were down 5-2. 

 

Again the Dock Spiders kept attacking the Chinooks, this time in the fifth. With one out, and Slome still in the mound, the Dock Spiders loaded the bases. Yet one run is all the Dock Spiders would get out of the inning. Lorenzo Rias, who got on base with a single, got driven in by an RBI single from Jared Heinzen. With one out, Slome and the Chinooks got out of the inning with a ground out and a fly out and were down 6-2 after five and a half innings. 

 

Meanwhile, the Dock Spiders starter Eric Sipling went for five innings before being replaced by Jack Niedringhaus for the start of the bottom sixth. Sipling allowed three hits, two earned runs, two walks, and five ks. The Chinooks threatened in the bottom sixth with a runner on third, but were denied by the Dock Spiders. Slome, who’s been in since the top of the second, is still going strong into the seventh. 

 

Entering the bottom of the seventh. The Chinooks were down 6-2. With this being the last game of the season, the Chinooks couldn’t and, more importantly, wouldn’t go down without a fight. In the seventh, the Chinooks battled and added on two runs in the inning. Gabe Roessler, the leadoff man, got on board with a single. From there, a deep hit to left center by Counsell sent in Roessler from first. With any more power, the ball could have gone over the fence. Nonetheless, a triple would have to do. Drew Townsend sent Counsell home with a sac fly cutting the lead to 6-4 in favor of the Dock Spiders. 

 

After six innings, Slome would be replaced by Griffin Smith before the start of the eighth. Smith, who has a nice changeup, would be tasked with stopping the Dock Spiders’ offense in hopes of a Chinook’s comeback. 

 

After coming up empty offensively in the eighth, the Chinooks allowed a run in the top of the ninth. Heading into their last half inning of the year, the Chinooks were down 7-4. Ending on a walk-off would be an ideal ending for the Chinooks faithful that up to this point, watched twenty-three Chinooks losses. Yet the Chinooks would be unable to come back in this one finishing the second half of the season with a 13-24 record. Jack Counsell would be the last out of the year for the Chinooks.