Broncbusters bounce back; take game two from Butler

By Mike Pilosof

Garden City, KS-Assistant Coach Jay Gundy said it best following game two of the Broncbusters' opening conference series with Butler.

"The Jayhawk is just a whole different deal," he shouted out while walking back to the locker room.

The longtime coach couldn't have said it any better.

Following their game one drubbing, the Broncbusters regrouped in a big way. Southern University transfer, Michael Wright collected three hits, Raul Garcia notched his second win of the season, and Garden City answered their run-rule loss with a 6-4 victory in game two Thursday afternoon at Williams Stadium.

"I've told our guys the teams that find a way to bounce back quicker, are the ones that will be successful," Head Coach Chris Finnegan said. "The teams that can't figure out their mistakes and correct them are the ones who will struggle. We figured some things out in that second game."

Well, the first thing that Garden City figured out was to hand the ball to southpaw Raul Garcia, who blended his pitches perfectly in four solid innings where he allowed just one earned run on three hits and struck out three. It was by no means perfect, but Garcia never seem rattled, even when Butler knotted things up with two runs in the fourth.

"When you're putting up zeros on the pitching side of things, that helps," Finnegan stated.

It also helped that Garcia was spotted an early lead on Kyle Jameson's picture-perfect sacrifice push bunt up the first-base line in the 2^nd that allowed Ibrhaim Rodriguez to score from third. An inning later, Will Gardner provided a two-out RBI knock when he fought off a Braxton Hyde fastball and stroked it into left to put the Broncbusters up 2-0. But the Grizzlies drew even in the 4^th. Noah Argenta doubled home a run; then scored on a passed ball. Garcia though avoided any further damage by striking out Johnathan Contreras and getting Zach Stroh to ground out.

The Broncbusters went back in front in their half of the 4^th when Ryan Muniz provided a two-out, RBI single to right to make it 3-2. But with runners at the corners, Garden City couldn't stretch the lead, and Geoff Marlow bounced out to second.

Those stranded runners came back to bite the Broncbusters in the 5^th when Jackson Syring began a two-out rally with a five-pitch walk before Bryce Zimmerer mashed a sinking liner down the first-base line that knotted the score at 3.

After Garden City grabbed the advantage again in the bottom half on Mason Mitchell's run-scoring single, Butler drew even one more time when Josh Cameron knocked a base hit to left; made it to third on an error; then came home on Jonah Cox's sacrifice fly. But the Broncbusters took the lead for good in the 6^th on Tyler Barth's sac fly; then added some insurance in the 8^th when Michael Wright clobbered an RBI double to the gap to make it 6-4.

The bullpen, more specifically Caleb Ayers took it from there.

The freshman right hander collected his second consecutive save striking out three straight batters after surrendering a lead-off single to Sam Siegel in the 9th. He along with DJ Burke and Ryan Estey allowed just one earned run over five innings of relief. It was a welcome sight for Finnegan.

"We got some good starting pitching, and our bullpen was better," he said.

Barth finished 2-for-3 at the plate for the Broncbusters, and Mitchell and Jameson each recorded multi-hit games.

Grizzlies' starter, Braxton Hyde was charged with two earned runs on seven hits in 3.2 innings.