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Canaries Take Series Opener

By: Will Glocker

Sioux City, Iowa (July 14th, 2022) - The Sioux Falls Canaries bullpen tossed four hitless and scoreless innings to beat the Explorers 7-4 in the series opener.

The Canaries scored a pair of runs in the second. Trey Michalczewski led off the inning with a walk followed by a Gavin LaValley homer to give the Canaries a 2-0 lead.

The Explorers were able to cut the deficit in half in the bottom half of the second. Sebastian Zawada led off the inning with a solo shot to left.

Sioux Falls extended their lead in the third plating two more runs. Osvaldo Martinez led the inning off for with a double. Michalczewski then singled that drove in Martinez. LaValley singled in Ulrich who reached on a single to give the Birds a 4-1 lead. 

Sioux City tied it up in the bottom half of the third. Blake Tiberi lead off with a hit by pitch and Danny Amaral doubled. Trey Martin homered to left to tie the game 4-4.

The Canaries took the lead for good in the fifth. Jabari Henry walked with one out and later scored on a LaValley fielder’s choice to take a 5-4 lead.

Kevin McCanna (5-3) ended the night with four and one third innings pitched taking the loss. McCanna gave up seven hits and five runs on three walks and three strikeouts. 

Ty Culbreth (6-3) went five innings picking up the win. The lefty only gave up the four runs on six hits and one strikeout without a walk.

In the seventh Ulrich led off with a single. Aaron Takacs scored Ulrich after reaching on an error with two outs extending the Canary lead, 6-4.

In the eighth Sioux Falls grabbed one more run. Shamoy Christopher clobbered a solo homer down the left field line to gave the game its final score, 7-4. 

The bullpen for Sioux Falls consistently mowed down Sioux City bats. Sioux Falls pitching retired the final fourteen of fifteen Explorers that came to the plate. The combination of Charlie Hasty, Matt Dunaway, Mitchell Walters and Riley Ferrell combined for four no hit and scoreless innings to keep the X’s bats from staging a comeback. After one one strikeout from Culbreth in five innings, the Canaries pen combined to fan eight Explorers over the final four frames. Ferrell (10) picked up the save with a scoreless ninth.

Game two of the three game set between the Explorers and Canaries starts at 7:05 p.m. on Friday. Lefty Tom Windle (3-2, 3.19) gets the nod for the X’s and righty Joey Pulido (1-4, 6.34) starts on the bump for the Canaries.