The Kelowna Falcons offence came back late in the game, but it was too little, too late in 9-5 West Coast League loss Sunday night to the Corvallis Knights at Elks Stadium.
It was Kelowna’s fifth loss in a row, all at the hands of the Knights.
The Falcons battle late but fall in the season series finale to the @CorvKnights by a 9-5 score and drop their fifth game in a row#BaseballLivesHere #WCL pic.twitter.com/VZoT9jooLu
— Kelowna Falcons (@kelownafalcons) July 30, 2018
Zak Taylor collected two doubles, four hits and was on base five times while Briley Knight drove in four runs in the Corvallis victory. The Knights hit a pair of home runs and compiled 13 hits as a team to sweep the Falcons in the season series.
The Knights opened the scoring in the game with a bang in the top half of the 1st inning, scoring twice to take an early lead. A double play brought in a lead-off walk in the way of Chad Stevens before Austin Feist drilled a solo home run to left field off of Falcons starter Zac Bygum to take a 2-0 lead after the top half of the opening frame.
Corvallis extended their lead in the 3rd inning with three runs to get ahead by an even greater margin. Feist continued his strong season against Kelowna with an RBI single for his second run batted in of the game before Briley Knight laced a two-run double to left center field to plate a pair and give the Knights a 5-0 lead.
Kelowna had a response in the 3rd as they were held hitless for the first two innings of play before newcomer Adam Stevens led off the inning with a walk followed by a Garret Kelly single before Matt Voelzke brought in a run with a single of his own for his 22nd RBI of the season and cut the Knights lead to 5-1.
Corvallis’ bats were hitting well for the second straight night as the offence continued to drive in runs with a lead-off solo home run off the bat of Beau Philip to push the Knights lead to 6-1.
Two more Knights runs came across in the 5th inning, which included three doubles from Corvallis. Chandler Anderson led off the inning with a two-bagger before Zak Taylor drove him in with an RBI double before Knight collected his third RBI of the game with a double to left center to push Corvallis ahead by an 8-1 score.
Corvallis extended their lead again in the 8th inning with Briley Knight’s fourth RBI of the night on a sacrifice fly before a wild pitch in the bottom half of the inning gave Kelowna their second run of the game to make the score 9-2 after seven innings of play.
The Falcons offence chipped away at the lead in the 8th inning as Dylan Orick one hopped the wall for a ground-rule double and his 4th RBI of the season before Matt Land brought in a pair in the 9th inning with a single but it was too late as the Falcons fell to Corvallis by a 9-5 score.
Bygum started the game for Kelowna, going 2.2 innings and surrendered 5 runs and took the loss for the Falcons while Kolby Somers earned the win for Corvallis, pitching 5 innings and giving up just one run in three hits.
The Falcons (23-21/9-9) have a day off before starting a 10-game, nine-night stretch to end the West Coast League season as they head to Washington to take on the Walla Walla Sweets (23-22/8-10) beginning on Tuesday night at Borleske Stadium for a 6:35 p.m. first pitch. The game can be caught on the Falcons Broadcast Network with the Voice of the Falcons, Trevor Miller.
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