Conquistador baseball wins two in Garden City

Garden City, Kan. (westernkansasnews.com)–The first two games of the four-game series took place at Williams Stadium on Thursday, as Garden City played host to Dodge City in a Jayhawk West doubleheader. Both games were competitive and went to the end, as the Conqs would win a pair of games, winning 1-0 in the opener and 9-5 in the finale.

In the first game, Dodge City scored it’s lone run in the first inning, on a Max Towchik RBI single that scored Juan Rivera. The Broncbusters could only produce two hits in the game, and had one in the second and one in the seventh. Garden City had two chances to score, as they had a runner at second in the fifth inning. They thought they scored the game-tying run after a dropped third strike, with a high throw to first, but the umpire ruled that there was runner interference. In the seventh, the Busters got a leadoff double from Dawson Stutz, but were unable to bring him home.

Garret Carter got the win, going all seven innings, giving up two hits and struck out nine. Andew Bowman had one of his top outings of the year for Garden City, as he gave up a run on six hits with seven strikeouts in the loss.

The second game saw Dodge City score the first run of the game in the top of the first on a Brian Hallum RBI Sac Fly that scored Jordan Rodriguez. Garden City tied the game in the third on a RBI Sac Fly by Caleb Metzen that scored Brittain Brewer. As soon as the Busters tied the game, the Conqs would reclaim the lead in the top of the fourth, with a pair of runs to lead 3-1. Dodge City pushed their lead to 4-1 in the sixth, while Garden City pulled to within 4-2 in the bottom of the frame. Both teams would tack on a pair of runs in the seventh inning to make the score 6-4. The Broncbusters put two runners on in the bottom of the eighth, and had runners on second and third, but were unable to bring them home. In the top of the ninth, the Conqs took advantage of a pair of errors, as they scored three runs to go up 9-4, and Garden City scored a run in the bottom of the ninth to make the final 9-5. Errors would hurt the Busters, as they committed six errors in the game. 

Luis Santiago went five innings in relief to pick up the win for Dodge City, giving up three runs on seven hits. Nathan Harmon drove in three runs and had two hits for the Conqs, and Brian Hallum had two hits and scored twice. Matthew Lorencz took the loss for the Busters, going six innings, giving up four runs, three earned, on nine hits. Caleb Metzen had two hits with an RBI.

Dodge City improved to 29-17 overall, 12-9 in conference play, while Garden City is now 5-36 overall, 1-21 in conference play. 

The series doubleheader finale is Friday afternoon at 1 and 3 pm at Cavalier Field in Dodge City.