By: Kasey Salamie
Southland Vikings Contributor.
Flossmoor— Thursday night’s game was a great example of the unpredictability of baseball. Sometimes you get the pitchers duels where a team wins 1-0. Other times you will get games where the offenses cannot be stopped. You just never know what your going to get on any given night. In the Southland Vikings (9-10) game against the Will County CrackerJacks (12-8) on Thursday night the offenses could not be stopped.
Both teams combined for a total of 40 hits for the game. The ‘Jacks had 22 of out of the 40 total hits. CrackerJack catcher Brandon Truitt had four hits on the day in seven at bats. Designated Hitter Steve Kedroski had three hits in six at bats with six RBI’s.
The Vikings had a plethora of impressive offensive performances. Mike Kane was ripping the ball tonight. Kane had three hits in six AB’s with three RBI’s. All three of his hits were doubles. Kane now has nine doubles in 57 at bats for the year to go along with a .316 average.
“Last game my timing was off. Tonight for the majority of my at bats my timing was perfect. I felt really comfortable and I was not anxious,” said Kane.
A.J Doyle had a big game at the plate. Doyle had three hits in four at bats, walking twice. Doyle is the team leader with twelve walks on the season. Doyle was productive by scoring three runs and knocking one runner in. His three hits increased his average to .333 on the season.
“I felt great at the plate tonight. We wanted this win because we kept battling the whole game. We never gave up,” said Doyle.
Kuris Duggan had a big day at the plate piling up four hits to bump his average up to .345. He added three RBI’s to his total of twelve for the season tonight. He has been swinging a hot bat as of late with eight hits in his last five games.
“It was different being the Designated Hitter tonight. I was really feeling it at the plate. I was confident in myself to get a hit every time I got up there,” Duggan said. Duggan continued to talk about the unusual game that ended with a football-like score of 19-16. “Both teams were hitting the ball hard tonight. It was one of those games that have a lot of twists and turns.”
Vikings first basemen George Patteson racked up three hits on the night raising his average to .338. Dawson added two hits to raise his average up to .313. Dawson is currently the league leader in homeruns with three.
Ultimately, errors are what lead to the loss for the Vikings. The Vikings committed seven total errors in the game. Viking’s manager Chris Cunningham was still proud of his team after the loss.
“You have to be really proud of the way guys battled. We were down at several points in this ball game and we never quit,” said Cunningham.
The Vikings did show in this game that they are a resilient team. It does not matter what kind of lead the opponent has they have shown they will come back.
They will play a double header in Rockford tomorrow.