Baseball Game Preview: New Life Academy Eagles vs. St. Paul Academy-Summit Spartans

The New Life Academy Eagles will head out on the road to square off against the St. Paul Academy-Summit Spartans at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday. New Life Academy is strutting in with some hitting muscle as they've averaged 8 runs per game this season.

The home team had won the previous four meetings between New Life Academy and Minnehaha Academy, and New Life Academy kept the tradition alive. The Eagles narrowly escaped with a victory as the squad sidled past the Red Hawks 9-7. While the Eagles didn't have the best season last year (they finished 2-17), it's starting to look like those struggles are a thing of the past.

Nate Duval made a big impact no matter where he played. He struck out six batters over five innings while giving up just two earned (and one unearned) runs off two hits. That's the most strikeouts he has posted since back in April. He was also big at the plate, going 2-for-5 with two runs, one double, and one RBI.

In other batting news, Sam Kowalski was excellent, going 3-for-4 with two RBI and one run. Those three hits gave him a new career-high. Nolan Wold also deserves some recognition as he hit his first triple of the season.

Meanwhile, St. Paul Academy-Summit was not able to break out of their rough patch on Wednesday as the team picked up their fourth straight defeat. They lost 10-0 to Blake.

New Life Academy is on a roll lately: they've won seven of their last eight contests. That's provided a nice bump to their 9-3 record this season. Those wins came thanks in part to their pitching effort, having only surrendered 3.5 runs on average over those games. As for St. Paul Academy-Summit, their loss dropped their record down to 2-7.

New Life Academy was able to grind out a solid victory over St. Paul Academy-Summit in their previous meeting back in May of 2018, winning 6-2. Will the Eagles repeat their success, or do the Spartans have a new game plan this time around? We'll find out soon enough.