For the third time the Gary SouthShore RailCats and the Sioux City Explorers met in the midweek series and the set was up for grabs going into Thursday. Dominic Cancellieri made the start facing Jasseel De La Cruz.
Henry George was able to get a hit to right field and move to second after one too many pickoffs from Cancellieri, and then a wild pitch put him on third. Braulio Vasquez drove him in with a basehit off the glove of Nick Podkul. De La Cruz’s first three innings resulted in seven strikeouts and him striking out the side twice.
In the bottom of the fourth, Kevin Watson Jr. worked a walk and Podkul would get a slider that hung and blasted it for his twelfth home run of the series and gave the RailCats a 2-1 lead. The next inning, with two outs and Elvis Peralta at first, Marc Flores doubled down the left field line and Peralta would score all the way from first move the ‘Cats lead to two.
Cancellieri would leave after the fifth inning. In the top of the seventh, Hayden Bailey started on the mound and after facing three batters Denson Hull would come into the game. Vasquez would single in another run and cut the lead to one. With the tying-run at second and go-ahead at first, Hull struck out D’Shawn Knowles with a changeup.
Hull would pitch a scoreless eighth and Jacob Coats would take the ball for the ninth and retired the top three Explorer hitters in order for the RailCats to win the game and series, the final was 3-2.
The RailCats are now 26-40 and are set to begin a new series on Friday against the Lake Country DockHounds. The First game is scheduled for 6:45 and it is K-Pop night with a Replica home jersey giveaway presented by Wintrust. Tickets are still available on www.Tixr.com/RailCats or call 219-882-2255.
