ALDIE, Va., June 24, 2015 – The Harrisonburg Turks won their fifth straight game as they defeated the Aldie Senators 5-2 on Wednesday at Champe High School. Turks starter Jordan Meyer pitched seven innings earning his first win of the season.
Meyer (1-3) pitched seven innings, giving up five hits, allowing one run, one earned, walking one and striking out six. Then the Turks Patrick Herbelin (Texas-San Antonio) came in to pitch the last two innings giving up one run to record his first save of the season.
The Turks offense recorded ten hits and Tripp Shelton collected three of those hits. Shelton (North Carolina Greensboro) went 3 for 4 with two doubles, a single, a walk, two runs scored and two runs batted in. The offense also got a spark from Tyler Straub (Texas-San Antonio). Straub went 2 for 4 with two runs batted in.
Senators starter Jordan Gard (2-1) threw six innings, he allowed four earned runs, walked four and struck out five. Sam McGovern came in after Gard and gave the bullpen a rest for the Senators. McGovern pitched three innings giving up one earned run and striking out three.
Aldie’s offense was led by Jake Brodt’s two hits. Brodt (Santa Clara) went 2 for 4 with his first triple of the season and scored one run. The Senator’s managed only eight hits on the night. The two RBIs came from James Pike and Joseph Consolmagno respectively. Pike (South Carolina Columbia) went 1 for 4 with an RBI single in the fifth inning. Consolmagno went 1 for 3 with an RBI single in the ninth inning.
The Turks scored single runs in five separate innings. In the first, after Shelton doubled and a single by Turks right-fielder Jesse Baker (Texas-San Antonio). Straub hit a sacrifice fly to center field making it 1-0. In the third, Straub came up again with runners on first and third and singled home Shelton to make it 2-0. Shelton doubled scoring Steven McLean (Baylor) all the way from first base making it 3-1 in the fifth. In the sixth, after Turks first baseman JJ Bissell reached via a walk and moved to second and third on two wild pitches. Turks catcher Erik Garcia flied out to shallow center for the first out of the inning. Then Turks left fielder Jared Baker (Oklahoma City) stepped in and hit an RBI single to stretch the Turks lead to 4-1. In the ninth, the Turks added some insurance after a single by outfielder Shane Billings (Wingate) he stole second with Tripp Shelton at the plate. Shelton hit a single to drive in Billings giving the Turks a 5-1 lead.
The Senators scored single runs in the fourth and ninth innings. James Pike singled in catcher Will Black (Roanoke College) from second base to cut the deficit to 2-1. Unfortunately the next batter Brodt was the victim of a “strike em’ out throw em’ out” double play to end the threat for the Senators. The Senators scored a run with one out in the ninth Consolmagno singled in Brodt after he tripled to make it 5-2. With two outs to play with for the Senators, Turks reliever Herbelin was able to get pinch hitter Will Decker (Roanoke) to fly-out to center and Matthew McMahon (Eckerd) to ground out to the pitcher Herbelin to end the game.
The Turks will face the Front Royal Cardinals on Thursday at Bing Crosby Stadium game time 7:00pm.