WATERLOO, Iowa – The Bucks added a few new players, and four of them made their debut on Friday night from Riverfront Stadium. Unfortunately, they weren’t enough to spark the Bucks past a red-hot Stingers offense.
The Willmar Stingers (5-6) came into Waterloo winning three of their previous four games. Willmar came into the game leading the Northwoods League in batting average, hits, and tied for the league lead in home runs. It didn’t disappoint as the Stingers combined for 14 hits. The Waterloo Bucks (2-9) threw Dylan Gotto who pitched into the seventh inning only allowing two runs until he was pulled for Anthony Pron.
Pron inherited two runners that would later score as Gotto’s line ended with four runs. Despite the high number of Stinger hits, Gotto was able to keep them off the scoreboard for most of the night. It didn’t help that the Bucks would commit four errors in the early innings of Friday’s game that allowed multiple innings to continue and for the Stingers to get more base runners.
The Stingers would plate three runs in the seventh to take a comfortable 5-1 lead that would end up becoming the final score. Three-hole batter Drey Dirksen led the way for Willmar with three singles, and three RBIs.
The bright spots for Waterloo were Dylan Gotto and Kyle Huckstorf. Gotto despite being the losing pitcher on the scoresheet pitched six complete only allowing two runs to that point, a line that wasn’t helped by the errors in the field.
Huckstorf, a newcomer to the Bucks, joined the team after finishing his freshman season at the University of Iowa. He would launch a solo home run 412-feet to left-centerfield in the third inning, in just his second at-bat of the ballgame. It would end up being the only runs the Bucks would score in the series opener.
The loss is the Bucks’ ninth of the season, as they’ve now dropped seven of their last eight games.
The Bucks will go for a series split on Saturday at 6:35 p.m. from Riverfront Stadium for the first Fireworks Saturday of the 2022 season. You can still purchase tickets to Saturday’s game at waterloobucks.com. If you can’t make it out to the ballpark, you can stream the game for free online on Watch NWL.
