LAKEPORT >> The Middletown Mustangs are streaking in a direction more to their liking after beating the Clear Lake Cardinals 5-3 in North Central League I varsity baseball action on Wednesday afternoon in Lakeport.
Since opening the season with nine straight losses, the Mustangs (2-0 league, 3-9 overall) have won three in a row, all on the road, including their first two league games. They scored three times in the top of the fifth inning against Clear Lake (1-2, 2-7) to snap a 2-all tie and that was all the support winning pitcher Keegan Cutting would need.
Clear Lake threw a major scare Middletown’s way in the bottom of the seventh. Reliever Thomas Cook retired the first two batters he faced but the Cardinals went on to score a run with the help of two Middletown errors. Cook hit a batter to load the bases before extricating himself from the jam with a game-ending strikeout.
The Cardinals had a 2-1 lead after three innings behind starting pitcher Cody Rybolt, who worked six innings and took the loss with a 106-pitch outing.
“I thought he threw the ball pretty well,” Clear Lake assistant coach John Garrison said. “He was around the strike zone all day.”
Rybolt struck out seven and walked two while Cutting struck out three and walked one.
Middletown’s three-run fifth got started with a Jordan Fowler infield single and a hit batsman. Isaiah Moore’s bunt single loaded the bases for Ty Chorjel, who bounced a grounder to shortstop. The Cardinals forced the runner at second base as Fowler raced home but the return throw to first base for a possible double play was off the mark and the resulting error allowed a second run to score. After Chorjel stole second base, Ezekiel Perez singled him home to make it a 5-2 Middletown lead.
“Physical and mental errors coupled with timely hitting from Middletown cost us runs,” Garrison said.
Perez and Moore each went 2-for-4 for the Mustangs. Hunter Daily went 1-for-3 with a double for Clear Lake and Cody Dillasaver (1-for-4) knocked in two runs.
Middletown is home Thursday to play Lower Lake at 2 p.m. Clear Lake is back in action Tuesday at home against Cloverdale at 4 p.m.
