Falcons Move Within One Win Of Advancing

The air was dry and the wind-chill factor gave the feeling of a game being played at Wrigley Field, but the 58-degree weather didn’t halt the Falcons as they were able to keep the bats warm in Thursday night’s HSBN Fall Classic tournament to defeat the Jaguars 11-1.

The Falcons improved to 2-0 in tournament play and will take on the Bengals on Saturday to cap the first round.

“Everyone on our team played baseball tonight,” Falcons manager Ray Evans said. “Our guys made nice plays and we didn’t make an errors. Everybody stepped up, and we hit the ball well.”

Dakota Doyle pitched all five innings for the Falcons, facing 20 batters and allowing just three hits.

Doyle gave up just one run in the first inning after walking Jaguars leadoff hitter Nick Diaz to start the game. Diaz came home off a Jacob Melton double for a 1-0 lead, but Doyle, a sophomore, located the strike zone and got out of the inning.

“Our pitching was great,” Evans said. “We rolled out another sophomore out there, and he settled down and just played catch, threw strikes and had the breaking ball working.”

The Falcons offense didn’t detonate until reaching the bottom of the lineup, which shined throughout the night, going 7-for-9 with four RBIs.

Eric Rivera got the scoring started for the Falcons in the second inning. With two outs already in hand, Rivera singled to right field, bringing in Ryan Dodge. Miguel Presno followed with a single up the middle, advancing Rivera. Andres Rios’ single brought in Rivera, and Andres Visbal doubled in Presno and Rios for a four-run inning.

Rivera led off the fourth with a single to center field. Presno and Rios belted in a pair of singles to load the bases for Visbal, who jacked up another two-run double, bringing home Rivera and Presno.

The scoring continued in bunches. AJ Munoz hit an RBI single, and Daniel Olivri had a base hit to bring in Munoz. The Falcons tallied in two more runs to close out a seven-run inning.

The Jaguars needed one run to dismiss a 10 run mercy-rule, but Doyle forced a pop fly and two grounders to seal the win.

“We wanted to come out and compete,” Jaguars manager Jorge Miranda said. “We had some lapse of concentration, and that hurt us. We’re young, and all in all, I like what I saw early. Our philosophy is to be aggressive, and tonight showed where we are and where we want to be.

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