The Motorboaters got the bats hot right away scoring five in the first three innings en route to a 6-3 victory over the Yard Gnomes. Morehead City improves to 8-5 in the summer while Greenville falls to 3-13.
The new additions at the top of the lineup Joe Quelch and Trent Youngblood had great 2024 debuts. Quelch had a two RBI double off the right center field wall, followed by a Youngblood single to bring him home. Youngblood ended the night two for four with a double and a walk to earn player of the game.
The pitching staff had a good night as well starting with Brent Francisco, who earned his third win of the year going five solid innings. The bullpen shut things down with four scoreless frames to stave off the Greenville offense. Koen van ’t Klooster came out of the bullpen first and went two shutout innings. Jack Decker was lights out to earn the save, retiring all six batters that he faced, including four strikeouts in a row.
The defense was stellar especially with the left side of the infield. Luke Scales made an incredible diving play to his right to begin the eighth inning, and Kamau neighbors showed off his lightning quick release with a couple tough balls down the third base line.
Greenville got things moving right away with a leadoff single from Gage Griggs to start the game. Griggs stole second and was moved to third from Joe Siervo on a groundout, and then driven in on a ground ball to first from Jack Herring. The next batter Abdriel Delgado hit a triple and scored on a rundown two batters later with runners on the corners.
The Motorboaters will soak in another off day tomorrow, their second in three days before their biggest stretch of the first half. The Motorboaters have six games over a five day period against the three best teams in the East division. Morehead City will begin that stretch Wednesday night against the Peninsula Pilots at Big Rock Stadium, beginning at 6:30 p.m.