Luis Lara didn’t get a chance to drive in the winning run for the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers in their walkoff win on Friday night. On Saturday night, he made sure the Rattlers didn’t need any runs in the ninth inning to beat the Cedar Rapids Kernels at Neuroscience Group Field. Lara drove in the tying run in the fifth and the go-ahead run in the seventh. Wisconsin’s bullpen tossed four scoreless innings with eight strikeouts to close out a 3-2 victory.
Saturday’s game was scoreless through four innings. Then, both teams scored a pair of runs in the fifth.
Cedar Rapids (82-49 overall, 42-23 second half) struck first. Misael Urbina singled to start the inning. Wisconsin starting pitcher Tyler Woessner retired the next two batters before walking the two batters after that to load the bases. Kala’i Rosario, the Midwest League leader in RBI, was next and he sent a liner up the middle. Second baseman Robert Moore made a diving attempt, but the ball tipped off his glove and trickled into center for a two-run single.
Wisconsin (61-68, 35-30) answered back in their half of the fifth. Alex Hall walked, went to second on a wild pitch, and took third on a flyout to center. Eric Brown Jr doubled by sending a chopper over the head of the third baseman to score Hall. Lara followed with a sharp single to center to score Brown with the tying run.
Sam Gardner relieved Woessner to start the top of the sixth inning. He worked around a two-out walk in the sixth. In the seventh, he had to pitch around a two-out walk that was followed by a two-out single. Gardner found a way through and kept the game tied.
Malik Barrington relieved Cedar Rapids starting pitcher John Klein in the sixth. Barrington retired the first five batters he faced. Then, he walked Brown with two outs in the bottom of the seventh.
Brown stole second, his thirty-seventh stolen base of the season, with Lara at the plate. Lara, who was in the batter’s box when Brown scored the winning run in the bottom of the ninth inning on a balk on Friday night, took matters into his own hands on Saturday. Lara ripped a line drive to right that rolled all the way to the wall for an RBI triple. Brown scored easily and the Rattlers had a 3-2 lead.
Gardner gave up a one-out single in the top of the eighth inning but didn’t give up the lead as he retired the next two batters. Gardner pitched three scoreless innings, walked one, gave up two hits, and struck out six.
Tanner Shears was called into the game to finish the game for Wisconsin, and he did so in style. Shears got the first out on a weak grounder to first. He struck out the next two batters looking to end the game and collect his seventh save of the season.
Wisconsin has won three straight games from the playoff-bound Kernels in this series.
The season finale for the Timber Rattlers is Sunday afternoon at Neuroscience Group Field at Fox Cities Stadium. Aaron Ashby is scheduled to make his third rehabilitation start for the Timber Rattlers. The Kernels, who are heading to the playoffs to face the Peoria Chiefs on Tuesday night, have named Alejandro Hidalgo (0-4, 5.14) as their starter. Sunday’s game has a special start time of 12:10pm CDT. That means an early start to the day with the parking lot opening at 9:30am and the gates to the stadium opening at 10:30am.
