Mariners go 3-1 in Lewistown round robin
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LEWISTOWN — The Mission Valley bats that had been pretty quiet in the spring showed signs of life at the Redbird Round Robin last weekend to help the Mariners come back from Lewistown on the right side of .500.
The Mariners went 3-1 at the tournament to improve to 12-10 on the season. The Mariners scored two runs in their final at-bat against the Redbirds to open the tournament with a 6-5 victory. They followed that up with a 10-0 shutout of Lewistown’s B team and finished the tournament with a 9-5 win over the Great Fall Stallions. Their only blemish at the tournament was a 12-4 loss to Fort McLeod.
“The bats have been quiet, but we’re slowly starting to get there and it comes from the hard work of the kids. They’ve been taking a lot of hacks and trying to improve,” Mariner manager Jami Hanson said. He adding that with hitting there are no quick rewards, and his team shouldn’t get frustrated. “I know they can hit, that’s the thing. We’ve always been a hitting team and there’s no reason why we should change that.”
The Mariners finished with 29 hits in four games none bigger than Xavier Morigeau’s double to leadoff the seventh in the opening game of the tournament. Morigeau came around to tie the score after two passed balls. It was the only Mariner hit in the inning. After reaching on a throwing error by the Redbird third baseman, Matt Detwiler scored the winning run without a hit to advance him.
Jay Sorrell picked up the win for the Mariners. Sorrell didn’t allow a run and gave up only one hit after coming in for Derrick Rathe in the top of the fifth. Sorrell didn’t allow a run and gave up only two hits in 4 2/3 innings of relief work at the tournament.
Coming off a .500 performance in Helena, Mariner third baseman Tyler Linse continued to swing a hot bat. Linse went 2 for 4 and drove in three runs. Will Wallace was 2 for 2, scored two runs and drove in one.
Rathe struck out three, walked five, scattered four hits and gave up five runs – only two of them were earned – in four innings of work.
In his first outing of the season and the first time he took the mound in nearly two years, Detwiler gave up a lead off single to Lewistown outfielder Jordon Winger to start the game and then didn’t allow another hit the rest of the way.
Detwiler, who went 2 for 3 and scored two runs, struck out eight in only five innings of work for the shutout victory. The Mariners’ offense gave Detwiler more than enough run support. Kaileb Gillingham, who had a hit in every game at the tournament, went 1-for-2 and scored two runs, including the final run of the game. After reaching on the double in the fifth, Gillingham made it 10-0 after Linse drove him home with his third single in the game. Linse went 3 for 4 with two RBIs.
