Ralston Valley has enjoyed the comforts of home their last three games, but now they'll head out on the road. They will face off against the Arvada West Wildcats at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday. Ralston Valley will be hoping to continue their three-game streak of scoring more runs each game than the last.
On Thursday, Ralston Valley beat Lakewood 7-2.
Wyatt Morwood tossed a big game, striking out seven batters over five innings while giving up just two earned runs off three hits. He has been nothing but reliable on the mound: he hasn't given up more than two walks in five consecutive pitching appearances.
At the plate, the team relied heavily on Kai Douglas, who got on base in all four of his plate appearances with a home run and a stolen base.
Meanwhile, Arvada West came tearing into Thursday's match with five straight wins (a stretch where they outscored their opponents by an average of 5.4 runs) and they left with even more momentum. Their pitcher stepped up to hand the Chargers a 2-0 shutout.
The result came thanks to Brayden Reiner's shutout, as he gave up just three hits.
On the hitting side, Arvada West saw four different players step up and record at least one hit. One of them was Mateo Rowzee, who went 2-for-3 with a double.
Ralston Valley's win was their sixth straight at home, which pushed their record up to 13-8. As for Arvada West, they are on a roll lately: they've won ten of their last 11 matchups, which provided a nice bump to their 16-6 record this season.
The batters for both teams will have to hit smart on Saturday as both have some strikeout artists on the roster. Ralston Valley has been retiring batters left and right this season, having averaged 9 strikeouts per game. However, it's not like Arvada West struggles in that department as they've been averaging 7.2. Considering how easily both teams rack up Ks, the hitters on both teams better bring their A-game into this one.
Ralston Valley came up short against Arvada West when the teams last played last Thursday, falling 4-1. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Reiner, who pitched six innings while giving up just one earned run off six hits. Now that Ralston Valley knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps