St. Cloud, Minn. — St. Cloud jumped out to two first inning leads on Sunday evening and didn’t look back on either occasion in a doubleheader sweep of the Stingers at Joe Faber Field.

In the first game, Lee Miller hit a first inning home run to start the scoring for the Rox, who jumped out to a 4-0 lead before the Stingers (42-23, 19-12 second half) put a run on the board.

But Willmar countered with a pair of runs in the top of the third inning to narrow the deficit to two. The top three in the order continued to produce and the trio all reached to start the rally. Dan Motl led off with a hit by pitch and then went to third on the first of two doubles in the game by Storm Wilson. Reagan Fowler scored Motl a batter later with his RBI single. Then Ky Parrott followed with his team-leading 44th RBI of the year when he brought home Wilson on a sacrifice fly to cut the Rox lead to 4-2.

The Stingers wouldn’t get any closer than that the rest of the way. St. Cloud (43-23, 24-8) added single runs in the bottom of the third and bottom of the fourth to increase its lead to four. That four-run advantage would stand the rest of the way in the seven-inning contest.

In the second game of the twin bill, the Stingers got a solid start out of Tyler Heitmann, but the offense managed just two hits in the 3-0 loss.

The Rox again put a first inning run on the board, this time coming on an RBI double from Austin Athmann. A third inning home run increased St. Cloud’s lead to two runs, and the Rox added another single tally in the fourth for the final margin of victory.

Reagan Fowler led the Stingers at the plate in both games, combining to go 4-for-6 between the doubleheader, with an RBI and a walk.

The Stingers return home Monday for one game, as they take on Mankato at 7:05 p.m for Blues Brothers Night. The first 500 fans will receive Blue Brothers Sunglasses courtesy of Fischer Laser Eye Center. 



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 Reagan Fowler. 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.