MIDDLETOWN — Bryan Holt slugged his Lake County-leading fourth home run of the season, a three-run blast during a four-run fourth inning, and the Middletown Mustangs rolled past the Lower Lake Trojans 12-2 in a North Central League I North varsity baseball game on Friday at Wes Martin Field in Middletown.
Middletown (3-0, 9-8) climbed over the .500 mark with its eighth victory in nine games.
“Dan threw strikes and kept the ball down, a real good job,” Middletown coach Mitch Tucker said of winning pitcher Dan Sallee, who worked all five innings, allowing two hits, striking out two and walking none.
Back-to-back two-out RBI hits by Brett Humphrey, who doubled, and Dane Larson, who singled, gave the Mustangs a 2-0 lead in the second. They built on that advantage in the third as Holt”s three-run drive to center field pushed Middletown”s lead to 6-0.
“That was the big blow,” Tucker said.
The game was called on account of the 10-run rule after Dylan Pastor singled home Larson in the bottom of the fifth, Middletown”s fourth run of the inning, to make it 12-2.
Pastor, Larson and Holt finished with two hits apiece.
Kyle Buckingham doubled home both of the Trojans” runs in the top of the fourth. Jesus Fonseca doubled for Lower Lake”s only other hit.
“We really let ourselves down tonight,” Lower Lake coach Joe Mattos said. “The errors (four) we made were horrible. We”re a better team than what we showed.”
Lower Lake is 1-2 in the North and 3-9 overall.
