Suns Go Batty In Huge Win Over Colonels

It’s only the fall, but a win is a win and a loss is a loss. After losing to the Colonels last week, the Suns came out Tuesday night with a chip on their shoulder and revenge on their minds.

On the strength of three multi-run innings and 13 hits, the Suns opened their HSBN Fall Classic play with a commanding 14-1 win over the host Colonels.

The Suns set the tone early, coming out with a five-hit, three run first. Daniel Epstein, Andrew Denis and Isaac Zinguer stroked singles and scored, and Chad McDaniel and Bryan Hernandez also had hits.

After being mostly subdued through the next three innings by Colonels left-handed pitcher Chris Yersley, the Suns broke open a 4-1 game with six runs in the fifth. Jonathan Baxter’s three-run triple keyed the inning.

The Suns, who capitalized on an assortment of passed balls, wild pitches and errors throughout the game, tacked on four in the sixth to put the nail in the coffin.

“We talked before the game about coming out here and being aggressive offensively, and we were able to do that,” Suns coach Eddie Tisdale said. “Actually, earlier in the game we didn’t capitalize on some opportunities that we should have, but we stayed aggressive, we stayed the course of what we talked about in our pregame. We talked about being aggressive when we get into the fastball counts. We were able to do that. It didn’t pay off at the beginning, but it definitely paid off at the end. Any time you can put up multiple runs in multiple innings, you like seeing that as a coach.”

Denis, who had three hits, including a triple, and scored three times, said he and his teammates had a plan to get good offensive production and avenge that loss.

“That lefty, he was pretty good,” Denis said. “He had a good slider. We said from the beginning of the inning to look for that slider and try to go opposite field with it. That’s what we tried doing and we made adjustments and tried to get to him and we were able to pull him out and just keep the same game plan.”

Epstein, Hernandez and Sinkoe had a pair of hits each. Sinkoe scored three times, as did Zinguer.

To complement the offensive onslaught, the Suns got a strong pitching performance from Louis Sucre, who threw six four-hit innings, making the most of his fastball to keep the Colonels off balance.

“Louis has been a workhorse for me this fall,” Tisdale said. “He’s done everything for me. He’s got a lot of late action on his pitches. His fastball has a lot of late life. It’s a heavy fastball. You know it’s not flat and it’s not straight, and anytime you can locate a fastball and it isn’t flat and it isn’t straight, it’s going to be hard to hit. When he works down in the strike zone, he gets a lot of ground balls, a lot of weakly hit balls. He’s an amazing kid when he’s out there on the mound. He’s got good tempo, good rhythm, and he gets the job done.”

Sucre gave credit to his teammates in the field for making the plays necessary to bolster his performance.

“I thought I did pretty good, but my control wasn’t 100 percent today,” Sucre said. “My fastball when I located it was fine. That’s what helped me get out of this game. My teammates did great. I got a lot of ground balls to second base. Cameron Chafetz had, I don’t know, 10 ground balls. Sinkoe made a lot of good plays in the hole. My middle infield picked me up today.”

Denis said the combination of strong offense and dominant pitching was just what the team needed to open the tournament.

“I felt like the team came ready to plan today,” Denis said. “We were out to make a statement. It’s fun fielding behind a guy like Sucre throwing strike after strike and having the infield on its toes.”

Tyler Price singled and scored, and Connor Jones, RJ Henle and Jesus Denizards each had a hit for the Colonels.

The Suns take on District 4A-13 nemesis Hollywood Lions at 7 tonight, and the Colonels will look to regroup in their next game against the Deerfield Lions at 7 p.m. Thursday.

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