Pilots win Summer Solstice game over Nooks

Tim Barto-Chinooks

Game 10 Summary

The Chinooks' Saturday evening contest against the Anchorage Pilots was billed as a Summer Solstice Game, with a 9:00 pm start time. Perhaps all that sunlight provided energy to players on both sides, because the nine innings were completed in almost exactly two hours. Each team racked up seven hits on the night, but the Pilots brought more of those baserunners home than did the Chinooks. Centerfielder Jayden Hill went two for four, including a double off the wall in the ninth that looked like a home run off his bat; the wind, however, kept it in the park. Hill came around to score on a David Broughton sacrifice fly. Broughton also had a single earlier in the game. Keaton Laidley, the freshman out of Paris Junior College, went two for four on the night, including an outstanding eight-pitch at bat in the ninth, resulting in a single.  

Troy Lopez, a freshman from Westmont University, started on the hill for the Fish and went four and one-third innings, surrendering three runs; although two of those were unearned. He was relieved by Gavin Alveti for two and two-thirds, and then Louis Zulaica made his pitching debut for Chugiak-Eagle River in the eighth. Zulaica made a very nice play to close out the eighth, catching a line drive and then throwing to Jordan Jaffe to double off the runner.

Final score:  Chinooks 1, Pilots 3.

The Chinooks drop to four and six in league play (five and eight on the season).