Drillers Start Home Stand with a Comeback Win

Originally Published: Jul 23, 2010 11:35 PM CDT

Gerald Goodridge
Oklahoma Sports Staff Writer

TULSA, Oklahoma -- The Tulsa Drillers fell behind early Friday, but capitalized on late-game mistakes by the Arkansas Travelers’ pitchers to earn an 11-10 win.

Down 10-9 with two outs and the bases loaded in the bottom of the eighth, a passed ball and a wild pitch in the same at-bat allowed Anthony Jackson and Charles Blackmon to score and give Tulsa (47-50) an 11-10 lead.

The pitcher who allowed the final two runs, Ismael Carmona (2-2), was credited with the loss for the outing. Rex Brothers (1-0) earned his first win of the season, after not allowing a hit in his 1.2 innings of service.

Arkansas (36-62) took a 4-0 lead in the first inning, three runs coming on a Ryan Mount home run to right field with Charlton Jimerson and Nick Gorneault on base.

Kiel Roling scored on a ground out in the bottom of the first inning to close the lead to 4-1. The Travelers added one more run to the lead in the top of the third when Jimerson scored on a throwing error by Lars Davis.

In the bottom of the fifth, Anthony Jackson doubled to left field to score Davis and Matt Repec to close the lead to 5-3. Jackson scored on a ground out in the next at-bat to close the deficit to one run.

The Travelers extended the lead playing small ball in the top of the sixth. With a runner on second, Roberto Lopez hit a sacrifice bunt to advance Nick Gorneault to third, but a throwing error by the pitcher allowed him to score. An Andrew Romine single two at-bats later scored Mount from third and extended the lead to 7-4.

After a pitching change brought Jonnathan Aristil in the game, Alexi Amarista doubled to right field to score Roberto Lopez and Abel Nieves and take a 9-4 run. In the next at-bat, Jeremy Moore singled to right field to score Romine and take a 10-4 lead.

Tulsa closed the gap with a two-run single by Repec, a two-RBI double by Jackson and a sacrifice fly by Blackmon in the bottom of the sixth.

The Drillers will try to make it back-to-back wins in the second game of the series at 7:05 p.m. Saturday.