The Ortonville Rox had a busy weekend, traveling to Canby on Saturday to beat the Knights in an afternoon game by the score of 17-5, followed up with a win at home on Saturday evening by beating Appleton 14-4. They then traveled to Clinton on Sunday and lost 9-3.
In the Canby game, the Knights started out hot and scored four runs in the first and added a lone run in the second. The Rox scored four runs in the top of the second and trailed 5-4 after two innings. The defense and pitching shut Canby down the rest of the game, while the Rox continued to score, making the final 17-5 in an eight inning game. Leading hitters for the Rox were Riley Sammon, John Thomas, and Joe Fuller with three hits each; Cory Stattelman, Curt Schake, Jeff Watson, and Pete Ross had two hits each; while Chance Haugen and Tim Haugen each got one hit. Fuller hit a home run and had three RBI, while Thomas had five RBI of his own. Fuller started on the mound and threw six strong innings, giving up five runs on four hits, while striking out seven to get the win. Chance Haugen finished up, pitching two innings, giving up no runs or hits, while striking out four.
The Rox then hosted Appleton Saturday night. Appleton scored two runs in the second inning to take a quick lead, only to have the Rox come back and score eight runs in their half of the second to make the score 8-2. Appleton would score single runs in the 3rd and 4th innings, only to see Ortonville score three more runs in their half of the 3rd. The score remained 11-4 for several innings before the locals broke it open and ended the game by scoring three runs in the bottom of the 7th, making the final score 14-4 in favor of the Rox. Leading hitters were John Thomas and Chance Haugen with three each. Curt Schake and Jeff Watson each wrapped out two its, while Zach Giese, Pete Ross, and Chris Smith each had one. Curt Schake started pitching, going six innings and giving up four runs on six hits, striking out two. Zach Giese threw one inning of hitless relief, striking out one.
On Sunday, a trip to play the Cards up in Clinton proved to be too much, and the Rox were defeated 9-3. The Rox were able to manage only six hits off Mike Adelman, three of which were by Joe Fuller. Joe also had all three RBI for the Rox on the afternoon. Chris Fellows started on the mound, going four innings, allowing nine runs, four of which were unearned, walking three and striking out three. Zach Giese threw three excellent innings of relief, allowing no runs on one hit, while striking out three. Cory Stattelman finished up on the mound with a perfect 1-2-3 bottom of the 8th.
“Overall we played pretty well,” stated manager Ron Thomas, “the error ‘bug’ hit us a little bit up at Clinton, but we really hit the ball well. The Clinton defense deserves a lot of the credit. Every time we hit the ball hard, they seemed to come up with a great play. Ethan Armstrong played an amazing 3rd base and definitely saved the Cards several runs.”
The schedule slows a little this week. The Rox have a non-league exhibition game at Rosen on Saturday against the Prior Lake Mudcats in a 4:00 game, and then are at home on Sunday for a 2:00 game with Madison. Hope to see you at the ballpark.