The Victoria HarbourCats are now 2-3 on the season after an 11-4 loss to the Cowlitz Black Bears, in a game played Wednesday night at Sports Traders Diamond at Royal Athletic Park in Victoria.
Cowlitz, now 3-2 in the 2014 West Coast League campaign, broke the game open with five runs in the fourth inning and another four in the fifth, tagging University of Kentucky pitcher Andrew Nelson with the loss in his first outing as a HarbourCat.
The HarbourCats got a home run from Alex DeGoti, his first of the season and the team’s first at home this year. Victoria actually outhit the Black Bears 12-9, but made three errors, one more than Cowlitz.
The HarbourCats used six pitchers to try and stop the scoring — Nelson, Quintin Torres-Costa (University of Hawaii), Preston Ryan (New Mexico), Jacob McAdams (Arizona), Brandon Feldman (Otero JC) and Dylan Stowell (California Baptist).
Billy Sahlinger of Cowlitz was the winning pitcher, lasting into the eighth inning, striking out just two but scattering 10 HarbourCats hits.
The night before, the HarbourCats needed 11 innings to outlast the Black Bears 6-5. On Thursday night, the teams will play the rubber match of the series, a 7:11pm start at Sports Traders Diamond at Royal Athletic Park, on team poster giveaway night. Mikey Wright (San Jose State) will be the starting pitcher for Victoria.
On Friday, the HarbourCats start a three-game series in Bend, Oregon, against the Elks.
