Woe late at home
GK runs champions close
GEELONG-KOREA hit back after Thursday night’s recordbreaking Australian Baseball League loss against Brisbane but still lost game two 7-3 at Geelong Baseball Centre last night.
Twenty-four hours after giving up an ABL single-game record nine home runs in a 21-5 drubbing, GK entered the final inning level before the Bandits pulled away.
Brisbane broke a 3-3 deadlock in the top of the ninth on T.J. Bennett’s sacrifice fly and back-to-back homers from Andrew Campbell and Logan Wade.
Geelong-Korea tied the ball game in the seventh as it looked to complete another late-season comeback win.
Catcher Tae-Joon Lim drew a lead-off walk and advanced to third on a single from DongGyun Woo.
Hwi-Yeon Park’s groundball scored a run ahead of Jong-Hyuk Lim driving in the tying run with two outs.
GK reliever Geon-Yep Heo struck out Wade Dutton to end the eighth, stranding the go-ahead run on second base.
But Heo was unable to contain the Bandits in the ninth.
After a lead-off single to David Sutherland he walked Ryan Battaglia and Riley Unroe before recording an out.
Bennett flied into a double play before the back-to-back homers left Geelong-Korea facing a four-run deficit entering the bottom of the ninth.
GK was unable to mount another comeback.
Earlier, Brisbane overcame early struggles against Geelong-Korea starter JinYong Jang to take a 3-1 lead.
Back-to-back-to-back singles overturned an early 1-0 deficit. Jang struck out seven in 6 1/3 innings of work.
Jong-Hyuk Lim and DongGyun Woo collected two hits for GK.
The series continues at Geelong Baseball Centre from 7pm tonight.