Kelowna Falcons

Falcons Split

The Kelowna Falcons opened the 2022 West Coast League season with a 4-3 victory over the visiting Victoria Harbourcats on Saturday afternoon in the first game of a doubleheader.

The offence tallied five hits, none louder than the solo homerun off the bat of CJ Richmond in the bottom of the sixth inning. His first of the season would stand-up as the game winning run in the shorten seven inning contest. Jake Steels collected a pair of hits.

On the mound Brock Keller started and lasted three innings, giving up just one run. Reliever Nick Woodcock came out of the pen and threw four innings, striking out five while picking up his first victory of the season.

In the second half of the double dip the Harbourcats jumped out early scoring four runs in the top of the first inning sending all nine men to the plate and would ultimately win 5-2, snapping their three-game losing streak.

Falcons’ starter Cole Van Every, a West Kelowna native gave up one more in the third and was chased after 2.1 innings giving up five runs in total on six hits and walked two suffering the setback. Relievers Jacob Greenan and Kieren Hall pitched shutout baseball the rest of the way coming out of the pen.
The lead proved too much for the Falcons to comeback from scoring single runs in the second and fifth innings, recording just four hits. Troy Baunsgard had two of those four hits and drove in the run in the fifth inning.

Sunday evening the Falcons will host the Harbourcats in the series rubber match as Hiroyuki Yamada will get the start for the home side. Yamada will make team history as the first Japanese born player to ever play for the Falcons. It’s also Minor Ball Night at Elks Stadium, if kids wear their Kelowna or West Kelowna minor ball jersey to the game, they will receive a free ticket. Other tickets can be purchased HERE.

Photo courtesy of Tami Quan Photography

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.