Loves Park, Il. – The Rockford Rivets would split their double header with Fond Du Lac at Rivets Stadium Friday night after they won the first game 3-1 and lost game two 5-2.
Game one would resume in the second inning on Friday at 5 pm due to rain that cut Thursday’s game short vs the Dock Spiders.
Designated hitter Ryan Cole was one of two standouts in game one on the offensive side of the ball. He finished with two runs on one hit and a walk, while center fielder Parker Bates also managed to pick up a double and give Rockford the go ahead run to go up 2-1.
Anthony Holubecki picked up the ball for Rockford and went 5.0 innings while allowing one earned run and striking out five. Nate Schneiderman picked up the save after pitching 2.1 innings and allowing no hits in that time, while also striking out four.
Rockford went down early in game two after Fond Du Lac scored four runs in the first and eventually added another in the fourth to go up 5-0.
The Rivets would add two runs in the fifth inning while trying to put a comeback together. This wouldn’t be enough as the Dock Spiders put away Rockford with their pitching and went on to win game two 5-2.
A milestone was also set by Rivets’ Manager Brian Smith on Friday night when he managed to pick up career win number 100 as the teams’ Manager.
“It’s always huge for an organization to pull out 100 wins in the first three years,” Smith said. “For three straight years we have had some of the top colleges in the country trust us with their players and it’s a relationship we can’t take for granted.”
Rockford will head to Kenosha to take on the playoff bound Kingfish at 6:35 pm on Saturday.
The Rockford Rivets are a member of the finest developmental league for elite college baseball players, the Northwoods League. Now in its 25th anniversary season, the Northwoods 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 190 former Northwoods League players have advanced to Major League Baseball, including three-time Cy Young Award winner Max Scherzer (WAS), two-time World Series Champions Ben Zobrist (CHC) and Brandon Crawford (SFG) and MLB All-Stars Chris Sale (BOS), Jordan Zimmermann (DET) and Curtis Granderson (TOR). All league games are viewable live via the Northwoods League portal. For more information, visit www.rockfordrivets.com or download the new Northwoods League Mobile App on the Apple App Store or on Google Play and set the Rivets as your favorite team.
