A late rally fell short for the Peninsula Oilers Wednesday evening at Coral Seymour Memorial Park in Kenai, and the Alaska Goldpanners of Fairbanks walked away with a 2-1 nonleague victory.
The loss dropped Peninsula to 4-3 overall. Fairbanks is no longer competing in the Alaska Baseball League, meaning the game did not count towards the ABL standings, which the Oilers sit xx at 3-2.
With Panners reliever A.J. Franks on the mound in the bottom of the ninth inning, the Oilers managed to get runners on second and third, but Darius Hill grounded out to end the game. Prior to that, Brian Ruhm had opened with a leadoff single and Jeff Chapuran grounded into fielder’s choice. Jonathan Washam singled past second base to put two on base, and Alex Seifert put a sacrifice bunt to advance Ruhm and Washam with two outs on the board.
A night after the Oilers used a seventh-inning rally to ultimately win on a ninth-inning walkoff, the team was looking for more seventh-inning magic.
Jonathan Washam knocked out an RBI single, scoring Ruhm to close the lead to 2-1, but that would be all the Oilers could manage. Alex Seifert struck out and Hill hit into fielder’s choice to end the rally.
With an ill Zack Hamilton scheduled to start, Tyler Shumpert started on the mound and took the loss with four innings of three-hit ball, giving up two walks and striking out five.
From there, the Oilers used a variety of utility players to finish the game, giving Jared Huber and Austin Piscotty an inning of relief each, and Andrew Bash finished the final three frames with two hits and one run given up. Bash struck out four and walked one.
Just like Tuesday, the Panners took an early lead in the first inning. Justin Harrer’s RBI single scored Cole Krzmarzick, who got on base with a double.
In the top of the seventh, Krzmarzick recorded another double, this time aiding in the scoring run of Alex Mascarenas to put Fairbanks up 2-0.
The Oilers will travel for the first time today to face the Chugiak-Eagle River Chinooks at 7 p.m. at Lee Jordan Field.
Goldpanners 2, Oilers 1
Panners AB R H BI Oilers AB R H BI
Mscr, 2b 5 1 0 0 Hill, cf 5 0 0 0
Krzm, lf 4 1 2 1 Drrw, 2b 2 0 0 0
Harr, rf 4 0 1 1 Bggs, ph 1 0 0 0
Cnly, 3b 2 0 0 0 Mllr, c 4 0 0 0
Alk, 1b 3 0 1 0 Dwtt, 2b 3 0 1 0
Smth, ss 3 0 0 0 Wang, lf 3 1 1 0
Ngrt, ss 0 0 0 0 Ruhm, rf 4 0 2 0
Bntp, dh 4 0 0 0 Cprn, ss 3 0 0 0
Mllt, c 4 0 1 0 Wshm, c 4 0 2 1
Lrkn, cf 3 0 0 0 Sfrt, 3b 3 0 1 0
Totals 32 2 5 2 Totals 32 1 7 1
Panners 100 000 100 —2 5 1
Oilers 000 000 100 —1 7 0
SH — Chapuran, Seifert. SB — Connolly 1, Larken 1, Wang 4. CS — Wang, 1. E — Connolly 2.
LOB — Panners 10, Oilers 9.
IP H R ER BB SO
Panners
Wilhelm, W 5.0 3 0 0 0 0
Fernandez 1.1 2 1 1 2 3
Franks, S 2.2 2 0 0 1 1
Oilers
Shumpert, L 4.0 3 1 1 2 5
Huber 1.0 0 0 0 0 0
Piscotty 1.0 0 0 0 1 1
Bash 3.0 2 1 1 1 4
T — 2:47.
