St. Cloud, Minn. — Willmar had one of its best pitching performances of the season Tuesday night, but it wasn’t enough.

The Stingers’ Garrett Anderson and Jonathan Lycan combined to three-hit St. Cloud, but the Rox (30-18, 11-3 second half) scored a sixth inning unearned run to win 1-0 over Willmar at Joe Faber Field.

Making his second start of the year, Anderson ran into some trouble in his first inning when he walked two of the first three men he faced. But he got out of that first inning unscathed and took a no-hitter into the fourth inning. The only Rox player who scored was Brett Pope, who walked in the sixth inning and came around to score on a throwing error in the sixth inning after Anderson had left the game.

But while Anderson dominated, the Willmar offense, which had scored 23 runs over its last three games, couldn’t put much together against St. Cloud starter Reese Gregory. The Stingers (31-17, 8-6) got two singles against Gregory in the second inning, but a double play in between those hits limited the opportunity.

The Stingers got a runner to second base in the third inning, but after coming up empty on that opportunity, they didn’t get another runner into scoring position until the top of the ninth.

Lycan entered in the sixth inning and continued Anderson’s strong start to the night. Lycan did walk a batter and allow a single in the eighth, but struck out the final two batters in a big spot to keep the Stingers within one going to the ninth.

In that ninth inning, the Stingers put runners on the corners with two outs, but couldn’t cash in on the chance.

The 2015 Stingers season is presented by Marcus Construction. For more coverage of the Stingers visit the West Central Tribune online at www.wctrib.com. 

Tonight’s Center for Diagnostic Imaging player of the game was Garrett Anderson. CDI is your local medical imaging provider. It’s your choice where you go for medical imaging, for MRI, CT, mammograms and pain injections, choose CDI. Visit online at myCDI.com/CentralMN.