Baseball Preview: Palmyra Cougars vs. Hershey Trojans
The Palmyra Cougars will be playing in front of their home fans against the Hershey Trojans at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday. The pair have allowed few runs on average, (Palmyra: 2.1, Hershey: 2.4) so any runs scored will be well earned.
Palmyra's hitters might be in the hot seat on Thursday considering what happened against Mechanicsburg on Tuesday. They fell just short of the Wildcats by a score of 2-0. That's two games in a row now that Palmyra has lost by exactly two runs.
Jonathan Strohecker was a force to be reckoned with on the mound despite the final result: he struck out nine batters over five innings while giving up just two earned runs off two hits (and not a single walk).
Meanwhile, Hershey scored the most runs they've had all season to find success on Tuesday. They had just enough and edged Bishop McDevitt out 10-8. With that victory, Hershey brought their scoring average up to 6.4 runs per game.
The team relied heavily on Seth Wildasin, who scored three runs and stole a base while getting on base in three of his four plate appearances. The team also got some help courtesy of Bennett Sheppard, who scored three runs and stole a base while getting on base in three of his four plate appearances.
This is the second loss in a row for Palmyra and nudges their season record down to 7-3. As for Hershey, they pushed their record up to 7-1 with that win, which was their sixth straight at home dating back to last season.
The batters for both teams will have to hit smart on Thursday as both have some strikeout artists on the roster. Palmyra has been retiring batters left and right this season, having averaged 10.3 strikeouts per game. However, it's not like Hershey struggles in that department as they've been averaging 7. Considering how easily both teams rack up Ks, the hitters on both teams better bring their A-game into this one.
Palmyra might still be hurting after the 8-0 defeat they got from Hershey in their previous meeting back in March. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Hershey's Danny Nelson, who didn't allow a single earned run and only one hit while striking out 11 over 6.2 innings pitched. Now that Palmyra knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
