River Riders stay hot, take road game against JC

Published 1:40 pm Friday, July 7, 2023

BY RON MARVEL

STAR CORRESPONDENT

The River Riders stayed hot Thursday night taking the first game of a two game road set against the first-place Doughboys 4-2 to close within three games in the standings and extending their win streak to four games. Both teams flashed strong pitching and defense in the opening innings as the game stood scoreless through the first four innings. Caleb Berry would get the Doughboys on the board first with a sharp ground ball past short to score Andrew Neil to take a 1-0 advantage. The Doughboys would take advantage of an error from Riders catcher Keaton Cottam to extend the inning and load the bases. Riders pitcher Sean Hollister then issued a walk on a called ball that just missed the outside corner to score the second run of the inning to make it 2-0. The Riders would look to Andres De Leon to get out of the jam and he would deliver with a strikeout to get out of the inning, leaving the bases loaded.

The Riders would answer with a run in the top of the sixth inning, Brendan Jones would smack a double to left and then scamper to third after a passed ball called strike three. Dylan Knowles would then pick up the RBI on a bloop single to center field. The River Riders would get things going again in the top of the seventh and take the lead for good. After a Keaton Cottam walk, DJ Dillehay would smoke a double to right scoring Cottam and sending Xavier Cintron to second who had previously been hit by a pitch. Dillehay and Cintron would come home on wild pitches giving a 4-2 lead to the River Riders.

The game would stay quiet for the next couple of innings as neither team could get much going. The Doughboys would have one last gasp in the bottom of the ninth to make the River Rider faithful in attendance nervous. The Doughboys would actually bring the go ahead run to the plate in the form of Caleb Berry after they got runners on first and second after a fielding error and a single by Doughboy Cameron King but River Riders pitcher Trevor Callahan would induce a pop-fly to right to end the game.

The combination of Sean Holister, De Leon Andres and Trevor Callahan would give up no earned runs in the contest striking out 12. Knowles would pick up an RBI, while Dillehay would pick up two of the River Riders four hits in the game. The River Riders will play the bookend game tonight against the Doughboys with a 7 pm first pitch time.