The Park University Gilbert baseball team, fell behind early, and could not get the key hit they needed down the stretch to complete a comeback as they fell to Midland University 7-5 at Tempe Diablo Field 1 on Friday evening.
The Warriors (3-0) jumped out to a 5-0 lead after two innings against Bucs starter Luke Richards (0-2) In the first, a chopper for a hit, a bloop single to right field and a ground out put the Warriors up 1-0 while not hitting anything hard against Richards.
The second inning saw the Warrior bats come alive with three straight hits to start the inning, before two errors and two wild pitches kept digging a bigger hole in the inning. When it was all said and done, four more runs had crossed and the Bucs were down 5-0.
Park Gilbert got a run back in the third, when Matthew Armendariz scored on a wild pitch, but the Warriors answered right back with two more unearned runs in the top of the fourth.
After a quiet fifth and sixth, the Buccaneers exploded with four runs in the seventh to cut the deficit to two. Armendariz reached on a wild pitch after striking out on a pitch in the dirt. He then reached second on another wild pitch, followed by a Cade Maestas walk. An error by the Warriors second baseman kept the inning going, before a two RBI single by Austin Chouinard cut the lead to four. Following a DJ Downen walk to load the bases, another wild pitch scored Chris Amador with the Bucs fourth run of the game. Joaquin Martinez then drilled a single to left center to score Chouinard, but Martinez made a base running mistake as he tried to advance to second as the throw came in, he was caught in no-man's land and was tagged out trying to retreat to first.
Now down only two runs, the Bucs had opportunities in the eighth and ninth innings to tie the game. The Bucs had a runner in scoring position in the eighth and had runners at second and third in the ninth, but in both instances, the Bucs flew out to end the inning.
Park left 11 runners on base for the game, a number which is way too high for a team with so many good hitters. After the fourth, the Bucs pitching staff held the Warrior bats in check, as Richards, Chase Provencio and Logan White held Midland scoreless over the last five innings.
Chouinard continues his hot start to the year as he went 4-5 with two RBI on the day. Five other Bucs had hits. Provencio and White only allowed one hit and one walk in their combined three innings of work.
The final day of the Firestorm Invitational takes place tomorrow, February 12 as the Buccaneers have a rematch with 13th-ranked Vanguard at 4 p.m. at Tempe Diablo.
