Tri-City 6 - Brooklyn 3

The Cyclones late season tailspin continued on Tuesday night as Brooklyn was defeated by the Tri-City ValleyCats by the score of 6-3.  Last week, John Gant tossed a one-hit complete game gem against these same ValleyCats, but tonight would be a different story.  The righthander was roughed up for six runs, five earned, on five hits while walking three and striking out two over 2.0+ innings of work.

The ValleyCats quickly pounced on the Gant and the Cyclones on Tuesday night, as James Ramsay led of the first with a double and was followed by back-to-back singles that led to a run.  Later in the frame, an error by Ismael Tijerina allowed a second run to score, giving Tri-City a 2-0 advantage.

The Cyclones quickly responded though, drawing even in the top of the 2nd inning.  James Roche and Matt Oberste had consecutive one-out singles to start the rally and put a pair of runners aboard for Eddie Rohan.  The Cyclones catcher responded with a line drive single to left field that scored Roche and cut the ValleyCats lead in half.  With Oberste now in scoring position, Ismael Tijerina had an RBI groundout to pull the Cyclones even at 2-2.

In the bottom of the frame, Tri-City would take the lead once again when John Gant uncorked a two-out wild pitch with Jake Rodriguez on third base to give the ‘Cats a 3-2 advantage after two.  But in the third, the ValleyCats would take control of the game for good.

Tyler White started the threat with a single and Conrad Gregor walked to put runners on first and second.  Ronnie Mitchell took advantage of the scoring chance with a triple to right field that scored both runners and chased John Gant from the game.  With Cameron Griffin now on the mound, Tri-City would cap their scoring with a sacrifice fly later in the frame to push their advantage to 6-2.

That is how the score would stay until the seventh inning when Matt Oberste connected on his third home run of the season, a solo blast, to trim the score to 6-3.  Later in the inning, the Cyclones would load the bases for Gavin Cecchini but Tri-City reliever Tyler Brunnemann retired the former 1st round pick to end the threat.

The Brooklyn bullpen tossed 6.0 shutout innings as Griffin, Paul Paez, and Ricky Knapp were solid, but the damage was done early.

With the loss, the Cyclones fall to 37-37 and now must win their season finale on Wednesday evening to continue their streak of never having a losing season in franchise history.  The team will send RHP Miller Diaz (6-3, 2.01) to the mound for the 2013 finale

Press Release