The Charlottesville Tom Sox beat the Harrisonburg Turks 8-4, pushing their win streak to three games. Charlottesville took the trip over the mountain to Eagle Field at Veterans Park Tuesday night to improve to 14-6 and extend the divisional lead over Harrisonburg to three and a half games.
After a pedestrian start to the game, the Tom Sox exploded in the second inning. Cal Stark (Weatherford College) started off the scoring when he launched his second home run of the season to left field. With two outs, Cole Foster (Auburn) tripled to right-center, past a diving Conor Hartigan, and was then knocked in on a Kam Guidry (Georgia) infield single. The rally continued when after loading the bases Elijah Nunez (Texas Christian) drove in two runs on a single through the right side of the infield. The ‘Sox would tack on one more when Nunez stole second and Gehrig Ebel (Virginia Tech) came home on a throwing error from catcher Reece Yeargain.
Harrisonburg would answer with a run of its own in the bottom of the second when Jordan Sweeney drove in Logan McNeely on a deep sacrifice fly, but the Tom Sox immediately added two more runs in the top of the third when Foster continued his big night by knocking in Stark and then stealing second, allowing Trevor Candelaria (Davidson College) to score on the throw.
The Turks would chip away with two runs in the bottom of the fifth on a two-run double from Frederic Walter.
In contrast to recent matchups, Tom Sox pitching was inconsistent once again. Starter Christian Worley (Virginia Tech) surrendered one run through three innings and gave way to Carter Spivey (East Carolina) who had a more rocky outing. He gave up a pair of runs in three innings of work. The best outing came from Angelo Cabral (North Central Texas College) in his Tom Sox debut. The righty worked a perfect inning and punched out two Turks before handing the ball over to Will Morrison (Auburn) for the final two innings.
The two teams will do battle again on Wednesday, this time at Crutchfield Park with the first pitch set for 7:00 p.m. for Military Appreciation Night. All fans can get in for free thanks for Carter Bank and Trust.
