Railcats Defeat Lincoln in Game #1 of Series

LINCOLN, Neb. - Hitting the long ball helped lead the Gary SouthShore RailCats over the Lincoln Saltdogs on Tuesday night. Home runs from Tanner Townsend and Jason Colson lifted the Cats (17-13) to a 10-2 victory over the Dogs (16-14) in front of a crowd of 4,357. Willie Glen improved to 1-1 after going six innings and only giving up a pair of runs. Adam Lesko (1-4) only lasted three innings for Lincoln allowing five earned runs in the loss.

Scoring began in the third inning as the RailCats got two across the plate. Eric McNamee began the inning with a single and scored when Townsend crushed a 0-1 pitch from the Lincoln starter over the wall in left field.

Gary continued a strong hitting performance when the team hit for the cycle in the fourth inning. Jason Colson crushed the first pitch of the inning into the back wall of the right field bullpen for a 3-0 lead in favor of Gary. But the RailCats weren't done scoring. Steve Haake continued the inning with a single and scored when Alex Taylor hit a shot down the first baseline and came around to third base. Jay Pecci finished the cycle for the Cats with a double into the right-field gap scoring Taylor. In all 12 Cats came to the plate in the inning with six runs crossing the plate.

The Saltdogs broke through Gary pitching in the fifth inning. With one down Jake Whitesides singled back up the middle to bring Albenis Machado to the plate. Machado took the first pitch from Willie Glen high and out of the ballpark for his third four bag hit of the year.

In the sixth inning the parade of home runs continued as Colson hit his second long ball of the night to left field. He took the 2-1 pitch from Saltdogs reliever Kyle Ruwe out of the park for his sixth of the year.

Lincoln and Gary continue their series on Wednesday night with a 7:05 p.m. first pitch. Michael Kesten (3-0) will take the hill for Lincoln while Gary will send Greg Bruso (0-3) to the mound.

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