East Bay is 1-9 against Durant since April of 2018 but they'll have a chance to close the gap a little bit on Thursday. The East Bay Indians will head out on the road to challenge the Durant Cougars at 7:00 p.m. East Bay is looking to tack on another W to their eight-game streak on the road dating back to last season.
While East Bay has not struggled against Plant City recently, they managed to flip the script on Tuesday. East Bay narrowly escaped with a victory as the squad sidled past Plant City 4-2.
East Bay saw five different players step up and record at least one hit. One of them was Jessalyn Lugo, who scored a run and stole a base while going 1-for-3.
Meanwhile, Durant beat Riverview on Tuesday by the very same score they won with in their prior game: 9-5. The win made it back-to-back victories for Durant.
Betty Oderio was a major factor no matter where she played. She looked comfortable on the mound, tossing two innings while giving up no earned runs or hits (she also didn't allow any walks). Oderio has been consistent recently: she hasn't given up more than two walks in four consecutive pitching appearances. Oderio was also big at the plate, scoring two runs while going 2-for-4.
In other batting news, the team relied heavily on Bricelyn Bedenbaugh, who fired off two home runs, five RBI, and a double while going 3-for-4. Another player making a difference was Giana Lopez, who scored two runs while going 2-for-4.
East Bay is on a roll lately: they've won five of their last six games, which provided a nice bump to their 13-6 record this season. As for Durant, their record is now 9-7.
Fans could be in store for some top-tier slugging on Thursday. East Bay hasn't had any problems when it comes to power this season, having averaged 0.4 home runs per game. However, it's not like Durant struggles in that department as they've been averaging 0.8. With so much power on both teams, it'll be down to the pitchers to keep the mound locked down.
East Bay suffered a grim 7-0 defeat to Durant when the teams last played back in March. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Oderio, who didn't allow a single earned run while striking out 11 over seven innings pitched. Now that East Bay knows the damage she can cause, will they be able to stop her this time? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
