Kelowna Falcons

Comeback Victory

The Kelowna Falcons came from behind to earn back-to-back victories as an 8th inning RBI single from Cody Crowder helped Kelowna to a 5-4 victory over the Bend Elks on Thursday night at Elks Stadium.

Trent Tinglestad continued his hot series as he collected a pair of hits and two RBI’s while the bullpen for Kelowna came in and got the Falcons out of a few jams to hold the Elks scoreless in the final three innings of play to earn the series win and attempt to go for the series sweep on Friday.

The Elks started the game strong as they took the lead in the opening inning of the ballgame with Alex Pallios driving home Jake Holton with two outs with an RBI double to give Bend their first lead of the series at 1-0.

Sam Muskat started the game for the Elks and pitched strong, going 4.1 IP and went through the first four innings holding the Falcons to just two hits as Bend took a 2-0 lead in the 4th with an RBI double from Chris Diehl before Keiser Weiss came in to score on a fielder’s choice in the 5th inning to push the Bend advantage to 3-0.

The Falcons had a quick response in the home half of the inning that was led off with a double from Davis Todosichuk, one of his three hits in the game, and was driven in by a Trent Tinglestad RBI single to get Kelowna on the board and cut the deficit to 3-1.

The Elks struck in the third consecutive inning in the 6th frame as Ian Nowak scored on a passed ball to get Bend ahead by a 4-1 score before the Kelowna answered that in the bottom half as Taylor Wright led off with a double and scored on a Jake Fischer groundout to cut the lead to 4-2.

The only multi-run inning was in the 7th and got the Falcons knotted up 4-4 as it was again Todosichuk leading off the inning with a base hit and was later cashed in on an RBI double by Tinglestad for his second run batted in of the game. An error by shortstop Ty Holmstrom allowed Tinglestad to score and tie the game with two outs as the Falcons came from behind to get the game evened up, which brought an uproar to the 1,820 fans in attendance.

“I want to thank all the fans tonight, it was popping late in the game and the energy translated to our dugout as well,” said Falcons outfielder Cody Crowder, “It felt like a playoff game tonight and was a big motivator for our team.”

Bend put runners on the corners in the top half of the 8th inning before Zac Bygum induced a 4-6-3 double play to get Kelowna out of the threat and allow Cody Crowder to take center stage, lacing a base hit up the middle to drive in the eventual game winning run and give Kelowna their first lead of the game at 5-4.

“This team has had some really good pitching tonight and I was just trying to shorten my swing and take a simple approach at it,” commented Crowder, “I was able to get a ball up the middle and felt good to help the team drive in a run.”

Cal Hehnke came on and struck out a pair while sitting the Elks down in order in the 9th inning to earn his 6th save of the season while Bygum picked up the victory and reliever Bradley Gonzales took the loss for the Elks.

“I thought it was a super competitive game and it’s one that we had to find a way to stay in it,” said Falcons Head Coach Bryan Donohue, “We made some big pitches in some big spots in the game and I saw some energy out of our guys that I haven’t seen all season long; it was a fun win to be a part of.”

The Falcons (22-16/8-4) take on the Elks (11-30/4-10) in the series finale of their only three-game series of the season on Friday night at 6:35 PM at Elks Stadium. Tickets can be purchased at the Falcons website or at the door ahead of the opening pitch of the game.

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