By ANTHONY SAMBROTTO
NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. — The power went out on Niagara, Wednesday night. Literally.
The Geneva Twins defeated the Niagara Power by a final of 4-1 in a game that featured a 27-minute lighting delay in New York Collegiate Baseball league action at Sal Maglie Stadium.
The Twins led right from the start, with Nate Roethel (St. John Fisher) driving in Taylor Vile (Castleton St. College) in the top of the first to take a 1-0 lead.
The game would remain that way until the seventh inning with superb pitching performances from both Mitchell Powers (Southern Indiana) of the Twins and Dallas Deavers (University of North Georgia) of the Power.
Then things got a little strange.
In the top of the seventh after a pitching change for the Power and with runners on the corner for the Twins, several banks of lighting along the third baseline went out. Umpires suspended the game until the lighting was fixed– which it was nearly a half hour later.
It was worth the wait for the Twins, however, as they tacked on three runs in the inning with RBI base hits from left-fielder Roethel and J.T. Conti (Wayne State). All three runs came off of Power reliever Drew McLochlin (Huntington University).
After a long delay and a big inning for his team, manager Andrew Weeks decided to keep his starter in the game.
“I had guys in the bullpen ready to go, but he told me he wanted it. He had that look in his eye.”
Weeks may have to trust the eyes of Powers more often, as he dominated the bottom half of the seventh, striking out the side.
“I haven’t started a game since high school ball,” said the right-hander who threw just five innings this spring. “Summer ball you just live the life, go out there and throw. I was going to do anything I could to stay in the game.”
He stayed in until the eighth inning when Niagara chased him with a leadoff double from the bat of Conner Combs (East Texas Baptist University).
Powers finished with seven innings of work, giving up three hits and striking out six.
Niagara got on the scoreboard in the next at-bat as Combs stole third and came home on a wild throw from catcher Marty Napleton ( St. Joseph’s College).
The Power threatened again later in the inning when Caleb Lang (Cairn University) came to the plate representing the tying, but Niagara couldn’t complete the rally.
Kyle Monk (Emory) pitched a 1-2-3 ninth inning for the Twins to get the save, his first of the season.
Deavers threw 6.1 innings, allowing five hits and one run. He did, however, have two throwing errors on two separate pickoff attempts, one of which later led to a run in the first. The rest of his defense also struggled with several fielding mistakes.
Manager Jason Rebandt said he isn’t too concerned and added:
“We have a really good defense. But it is baseball, there are nights you are going to kick it around. I’m not too concerned about it.”
The Power scored eight runs against the Twins on Tuesday night, but weren’t able to repeat the effort on Wednesday, something Rebandt credits to the opposing pitching.
“He did a great job,” Rebandt said of Powers. “We didn’t know exactly what to expect out of him. He kept the ball down in the strike zone and kept us off-balance. It looked like we were uncomfortable at the plate in a lot of our at-bats.
“The thing I told our guys is that if we want to win a championship we are going to have to beat a guy who throws like that eventually.”
As for his part in the win, Powers said that his approach is always the same.
“I always have the same process, just trying to get the next out.”
The Power (2-1) travel to Rochester Thursday to play the Ridgemen for a 7:00 pm first pitch at Basket Road Field. The Twins (1-2) head home to host the Hornell Dodgers at 5:00 pm at McDonough Park.
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