The New Jersey Jackals and Gateway Grizzlies faced off in their final bout of this three-game in-season series. This contest would come down to the wire, but it didn’t always seem that would be the case.
New Jersey would set the tone early. In the first inning the Jackals would pop off for two runs in the first inning. Each of the first two home runs in the first inning would be recorded against Gateway’s starting pitcher, Gage Vailes.
Alvaro Gonzalez got things rolling with a double after hitting a fly ball to left field. Vailes would go on to strike out Isaac Bellony after conceding the double to Gonzalez.
Valies would throw four pitches before Aneudis Mordan would deliver a clutch double to center field, giving Alvaro the opportunity to score and giving the Jackals a 1-0 lead. Two pitches later, Mordan himself came around to score when Martin Figueroa produced a double to center field, putting New Jersey up 2-0.
The Jackals would keep their foot on the gas throughout the middle innings. In the third inning, a line drive to right field by Figueroa created the runway for Bellony to score, pushing New Jersey’s lead to 3-0.
The fourth inning would be the Grizzlies first time getting on the board as a single by Jose Alvarez, scored Dale Thomas.
Later in this inning, the Jackals would deliver an exclamation point.
This point would come in the form of Gustavo Sosa hitting a solo home run over the right-field wall, extending New Jersey’s lead to 4-1. It appeared the Jackals had all of the momentum and would cruise to a victory, but Gateway had other ideas.
Victor Castillo responded to Sosa’s home run with one of his own. Only taking one pitch in the fifth inning before he delivered a solo home run to cut New Jersey’s lead to 4-2.
The Grizzlies would keep chipping away at the lead. Thomas scored after a Bryson Horne single on a ground ball to right field, which cut the Jackals lead to 4-3 in the middle of the fifth inning.
To start the sixth inning, Gavin Baldwin and Cole Brannen couldn’t get anything going for Gateway. Then the person who got the Grizzlies back in the game would come up huge again.
Castillo delivered another solo home run, hitting the ball to right field and tying the game up 4-4. Both teams would be in a deadlock for the rest of this inning and the entirety of the seventh inning.
Eventually, the deadlock would come to an end in the bottom of the eighth inning. Noah Furcht smashed a solo shot to left field off Grizzlies pitcher Julio Ortiz.
Furcht’s solo home run not only gave New Jersey the lead but effectively the win, as the Jackals won this game 5-4.
