Pats drop two more; place third in Summer Series

Spokane Blue Devils defeated the Pullman Patriots twice in Spokane Tuesday night to start the third week of Spokane Legion action for the locals. The pair of losses in Spokane stretched the Pats’ string of league defeats to six.

The Patriots were tagged for five errors in each of the two Tuesday games. The Blue Devils took the first game 16-5 over five innings. They mixed in 10 hits, led 8-0 after three innings and added eight more in the bottom of the fourth. Nick Sourey started for the Pats, and Matt Peterson relieved him in the fourth.

The second round went to a 10-0 shutout over six innings with JJ Robinson throwing a seven hitter.

Pullman had five hits in the first game with Brett Druffel tagging a pair. They had six hits in the second game with Jeremny Druffel and Dusty Lyons each tagging two. Druffel doubled.

The two losses Tuesday at Spokane leaves the Pats’ 4-6 in the Spokane Senior Legion action.

The second half of the four-game Blue Devil series has been postponed until after the July 4 break.

Last Thursday, the Spokane Cannons crunched the Patriots 9-1 and 9-5 in the second half of their four-game league series. The two Thursday wins wrapped a 4-0 sweep by the Cannons over the Patriots in the second week of league play. .

In the first game, the Cannons posted a modest 8-6 edge in hits, but their hits booked runs. The Spokane hosts had an 9-0 lead until the last inning when the Patriots scored their lone run with Mason Van Lith of St. John tagging an RBI single.

Jackson Webb started on the mound for the Patriots and Nick Cundy, and Matt Peterson finished.

Webb had three of the Pats’ six hits.. Dusty Lyons, Jeremy Druffel and Van Lith had the other hits.

Nick Mosinger led the Cannons with three hits, one of them a homer.

The second game tracked the first with the Cannons stacking a 8-1 lead after three frames enroute to the 9-5 win.

Brett Druffel started on the mound for the Pats, and Curt Peterson relieved him in the fifth. Lyons had two of the Patriots ‘ eight hits with a double. Robinson and Brennan Ball added doubles.

Each team was charted for three errors in the second game after playing fault free in the first game

The sweep by the Cannons left the Pats at 4-4 after the first two weeks of the league race.

Between the two league episodes, the Patriots were one of eight teams in the three-day Palouse Summer Series which was waged at Bailey-Brayton Field and Lewis-Clark State College in Lewiston. The series set brought in the Blue Devils, two Crew teams from Spokane, Kalispell, Abbotsford, B.C., Washington Wave and the Lewiston Twins.

The Patriots ended the series run in third place with an 9-6 win over the Lewiston Twins Sunday. They faced the twins after rolling out a 2-2 record in the first two days of the series.

Sunday’s game in Lewiston saw the Patriots lead 5-0 before the Twins came to life in the bottom of the fourth to score four runs and make it a one-run ball game.

Curt Peterson had the start for the Patriots, and Nick Cundy, the Pats’ Clarkston recruit who pitched a win in the series opener Friday, closed it out. Cundy held off the Twins offense while the Patriots capped the win with a four more runs in the top of the sixth.

Final count was 11 hits for the Patriots. Asotin’s Dusty Lyons had three hits with a pair of doubles, and Brady Mooney had two hits with a double.

In their series start Friday at Bailey-Brayton the Pats had their best game of the series with a 9-1 win over the 17-under Spokane Crew team.

Gundy threw a three hitter at the crew and struck out three batters. The lone run for the crew was unearned.

The Patriiots scored two runs in the second inning and with Jeremy Druffel tagging a two-run triple. They came back with six more in the third inning with off four hits with Brennan Ball tagging an RBI triple to start the scoring.

Crew catcher Ryan Rapp had two of the three hits off Cundy.

Saturday the Patriots booked a series split with a 12-11 nip of the Kalispell guests, and a 4-13 bow to Abbotford, the long-distance guests.

Mason Van Lith of SJE started against the Montana club and the Pats pegged a 5-1 lead after three innings. They added seven more runs in the next two innings, and Kalispell added six. The K club bolted for four more runs in the sixth innings, but they were stopped a run short of pushing it past the six-frame limit.

The Patriots booked nine hits against Kalispell with Jeremy Druffel tagging a two-run single, and JJ Robinson later belting a two-run double. Brady Mooney also had a double.

Abbotsford scored three runs in the first inning and just kept stacking runs on the way to a 13-4 win.

Dusty Lyons started on the mound and Colfax grad Brandon Hoadley relieved him in the second inning. Matt Peterson pitched in the sixth.

Robinson homered against the B.C. team, and Webb and Lyons each had two hits with a triple for Webb and a double for Lyons.