Storm was facing something they hadn’t in quite a long time - the possibility of elimination on Saturday afternoon. Storm had struggled to hit against Broadway and that trend continued in the top of the first as Storm put up yet another goose egg on the scoresheet. Thankfully, Coulas was held off the board for the first three innings, so Storm’s struggles did not put them behind. In the second inning Storm finally remembered that hitting is more fun and put up three runs. The fourth saw Storm really return to form with four more runs. Unfortunately, it should have been more as there was some serious confusion on a fly ball that led to a double play ending the inning. If there had been no outs, it would have been a triple play because multiple runners left the base on a fly ball with only one out. Storm was still up 7-0, so it didn’t seem like it should hurt too much.
Except after three scoreless innings, Jeff stopped looking like Captain Underpants and started looking a little more like Broadside as he lost the plate walking three batters in the inning, including two with the bases loaded to score runs. Coulas scored four total and all of a sudden it was a game again. Storm was shut out in the bottom half of the inning and with only three frames left, it was 7-4.
In the fifth it looked like the bullpen was going to have to get ready, because Jeff walked the leadoff batter, but then settled in and Coulas was kept off the board in the fifth and sixth innings. Storm got the bats going again in those innings. The 5th started with back to back triples from Joey and Rene who both scored. Storm would add two more in the sixth and head into the seventh with an 11-4 lead.
Another leadoff walk started the seventh and gave Coulas the hope they needed. Jeff was actually trying to pitch around Pete, and after throwing three balls to start the at bat he intentionally threw one short, hoping it would be a walk or a pop up. It was a pop-up all right. It popped up all the way over the fence and Coulas was suddenly back in the game. There were already two outs, though, and Storm was able to hold on to an 11-7 win.
Storm managed to make it to Sunday and Sunday is a brand new day. While Storm did a great job of run prevention (only 27 runs across three games for an average of 9 runs against per game), the bats will have to wake up if they truly want to contend. They scored only 28 runs in three games. That’s an average of 9.3 runs per game. Their plus minus was a grand total of +1.
Final Score: Storm 11 - Coulas 7
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