Miners drop second in a row to Lake Erie

The Southern Illinois Miners dropped a 5-1 decision to the Lake Erie Crushers in the second game of the midweek series at Sprenger Stadium in Avon, Ohio on Wednesday night in a second-straight close contest.

Neither team scored in the first four innings of the game. Lake Erie starter Adam Quintana (3-2) allowed one hit while walking three and hitting one batter, but permitted no runs to score. Meanwhile, Zach Cooper (1-4) was also stellar in the first four innings, allowing two hits while facing just one over the minimum 12 batters in the opening frames of the game to keep it scoreless.

The Crushers broke through in the bottom of the fifth inning on a leadoff double by Brandon Murray and four walks in the inning by Cooper, including two with the bases loaded to force home the game’s first two runs and make it 2-0 in favor of the home team.

Southern Illinois got one run back immediately in the top of the sixth inning as Nolan Earley led off with a base-on-balls and went to third base on a single by Marc Flores. After a 10-pitch at-bat, Willi Martin grounded out to third baseman Cody Lenahan, bringing home Earley to make it 2-1. Thanks to good relief pitching on both sides, the game stayed 2-1 until the bottom of the eighth, when with two runners on base and two out, Tanner Lubach hit a sinking line drive into center field that got by London Lindley and bounced to the center field wall, resulting in a three-run, inside-the-park homer for the final 5-1 margin.

The Miners will close out their road trip and look to avoid a sweep at the hands of the Crushers on Thursday night in the series finale in Avon, with Ethan Gibbons taking the hill against the Crushers’ Connor Reed at 6:05 p.m.

BOX SCORE

Batting Stats

Batting
HP: N.Earley (2). RBI: W.Martin (6). CS: C.Massey (1). Team LOB: 8.

Fielding A: C.Massey 3 (48), R.Lashley (28), B.Moore (3), C.Plant 3 (17). DP: 1 (C. Massey(2B) – J. Chigbogu(1B)). PO: C.Massey 4 (31), N.Earley 2 (36), M.Flores 2 (9), J.Chigbogu 8 (168), B.Moore 3 (120), L.Lindley 4 (57). SBA: B.Moore (24). TC: C.Massey 7 (80), N.Earley 2 (38), R.Lashley (40), M.Flores 2 (9), J.Chigbogu 8 (183), B.Moore 4 (124), C.Plant 3 (24), L.Lindley 4 (58).

Batting
2B: B.Murray (2). HR: T.Lubach (4). RBI: C.Oliver (10), T.Lubach 3 (12), P.Norris (6). SB: S.Hurley (2).
Team LOB: 5.

Fielding A: J.Dean 2 (61), C.Lenahan 2 (30), B.Murray (1), T.Lubach 2 (18), M.Casper 3 (42), C.Jagodzinski (1). CS: T.Lubach (1) PO: C.Oliver 3 (42), J.Dean (41), B.Murray 8 (8), J.McAdams (132), T.Lubach 9 (155), M.Casper (19), P.Norris 3 (28), A.Quintana (1).  SBA: T.Lubach (23). TC: C.Oliver 3 (48), J.Dean 3 (108), C.Lenahan 2 (49), B.Murray 9 (9), J.McAdams (139), T.Lubach 11 (174), M.Casper 4 (61), P.Norris 3 (40), A.Quintana (7), C.Jagodzinski (1).

Pitching Stats

S Illinois
#	Pitcher	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	ERA
39	Cooper, Z	5.0	3	2	2	4	2	7.88
10	Lollar, J	2.1	0	2	2	3	0	4.15
40	Tinius, K	0.2	1	1	1	0	1	2.25
		8	4	5	5	7	3

Pitching
BF: Z.Cooper 21, J.Lollar 10, K.Tinius 3.
P-S: Z.Cooper 78-43, J.Lollar 42-22, K.Tinius 8-6.

Lake Erie
#	Pitcher	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	ERA
16	Quintana, A	6.0	2	1	1	4	5	3.19
11	Coakley, N	1.0	1	0	0	1	1	0.00
28	Lucio, S	1.0	0	0	0	0	1	3.38
29	Jagodzinski, C	1.0	1	0	0	0	2	0.90
		9	4	1	1	5	9

Pitching
BF: A.Quintana 24, N.Coakley 5, S.Lucio 3, C.Jagodzinski 4.
P-S: A.Quintana 104-62, N.Coakley 15-8, S.Lucio 18-11, C.Jagodzinski 12-8.
WP: C.Jagodzinski (1).