NAPPANEE – Things have a way of coming full circle in the game of baseball.
Two weeks ago, Plymouth’s Pilgrims plated five runs in the seventh inning to take a walk off win over NorthWood Panthers at Bill Nixon Field. Last night the Panthers returned the favor with a walk off single by Sergio Lira Ayala to give NorthWood a three run seventh and a 5-4 win.
“The way we were feeling about two weeks ago they’re feeling tonight,” said Plymouth coach Ryan Wolfe. “It was a great ball game. We got some key hits especially when we added one in the seventh to extend it and feel a little more comfortable. The simple fact is that in the NLC you can never be real comfortable.”
It was a pitchers duel of opposites – NorthWood’s power pitcher Matt Dutkowski against the finesse of Plymouth’s Tim Tremaine – that literally ended in a draw.
Tremaine gave way to Cole Filson in the seventh with a 4-2 lead after two singles to open the inning. Both of those runs would cross to tie the score, but the fifth run belonged to Filson, handing him the tough loss.
He made some big pitches to get out of trouble a couple of times, we made a couple double plays behind him to help out, said Wolfe. “We debated whether to leave him in in the seventh. He was okay pitch count wise we were hoping he could get an out or two early, they just put some good swings on balls there at the end.”
NorthWood scored first in the fourth inning when Trey Allman’s RBI single brought home Dutkowski who’d led off the inning with a walk.
Plymouth answered with three in the fifth — two of those after two were out — on RBI singles by Cole Filson and Kam VanLue. The Pilgrims added an insurance run with two out in the seventh when Jackson Lee singled home VanLue who’d reached on an error and stolen second base.
Five singles in the bottom of the seventh, with a sacrifice fly plated three to end it.
Dutkowski was sailing through four allowing just one hit and striking out five but had some trouble with Plymouth hitters at that point.
The second time through the order I thought we really did a good job,” said Wolfe. “He (Dutkowski) was kind of living away and so we started hitting the ball the other way and got some balls in the gaps they were giving us. We had two out nobody on and got two runs to take the lead. I thought we had a good day at the plate all the way around.”
The Pilgrims had seven hits on the night, Thomas Dolan was 2-3 with a double.
“Our kids know how to make adjustments from at bat to at bat,” said Wolfe. “It’s a tough loss. We’re going to look at the fact that we did a lot of things well enough to win the game.”
The Pilgrims — now 13-9 on the year — will have to strap it up and play again tonight at Northridge in another tough road game.
“That’s what it is this time of year,” said Wolfe. “We’re playing good baseball. They’re going to be tight games from here on. Our kids battled and played well enough to win.”
•NORTHWOOD 5, PLYMOUTH 4
at NorthWood
Plymouth 0 0 0 0 3 0 1 4-7-2
NorthWood 0 0 0 1 0 1 3 5-10-5
WP — Dutkowski. LP — Tremaine. 2B — Dolan.
