MANCHESTER, NH – The New Hampshire Fisher Cats were beneficiaries of a ninth inning implosion on Tuesday. Wednesday was a different story….
Andrew Case gave up four runs in the top of the ninth, letting the Reading Fightin’ Phils escape Manchester with a 6-5 early matinee victory.
New Hampshire hurler Sean Reid-Foley seemed destined for his fifth win of the season, striking out ten Reading batters in six innings of work.
Reid-Foley wasn’t flawless, but the Fightins’ were unable to make headway outside of Zach Green’s homer in the second and a three-hit fifth that saw Jan Hernandez come home on Zach Coppola’s RBI bunt.
Meanwhile, Harold Arauz submitted an almost as impressive start for the Fightins, going 6 2/3 innings with just three earned runs: Cavan Biggio’s first inning solo home run and a Max Pentecost double in the sixth that brought the other two Arauz runs across the plate.
Bo Bichette scampered home in the eighth following a botched pickoff attempt and it appeared that New Hampshire’s victory was safe, but then came the ninth.
Case entered the contest and immediately gave up back-to-back home runs to Damek Tomscha and Green, both reaching the Hilton Garden Inn patio.
That tied the game, with three doubles over the next four at-bats bringing the other two runs across the plate.
Juan Kelly’s first home run of the year provided hope for New Hampshire in the bottom of the ninth, but Trevor Bettencourt would settle down from there, retiring the next three batters he faced to grab his first save of the year.
Tyler Gilbert (3-0) got the win for his four outs in between Arauz and Bettencourt, with Case getting the loss and his first blown save of the season.
At the plate, New Hampshire received two-hit days from Bichette, Biggio, Kelly and Harold Ramirez while Reading got two-hit performances from Green, Coppola and Hernandez.
The Fisher Cats now head out Binghamton, New York for a four-game set with the Binghamton Rumble Ponies. Jon Harris (1-1, 6.52 ERA) takes the mound for New Hampshire at 6:35 p.m. against Binghamton’s Mickey Jannis (2-0, 2.61 ERA)
