At some point in the distant future, Thursday will be looked at as the first time Coral Seymour Memorial Park and the Alaska Baseball League saw sudden death baseball.
For now, the new format for extra innings is just the exclamation point on a frustrating doubleheader sweep for the Oilers at the hands of the Anchorage Bucs.
The Bucs won the first game 2-1 before winning the second game 6-5 in extra innings.
Anchorage moves to 8-7 in the league and is tied for second with the Mat-Su Miners at 7-6. The Anchorage Glacier Pilots lead the league at 7-5.
The Chugiak-Eagle River Chinooks are in fourth place at 5-6, while the Oilers are 2.5 games in back for first at 5-8.
The Bucs, now 5-1 against the Oilers this season, finish the five-game series in Kenai with 6 p.m. games on Friday and Saturday.
The ABL adopted a new policy of sudden death for extra innings this year. The ABL follows developmental leagues like the MLB Draft League in adopting the policy in order to limit the wear on pitching staffs.
In the ABL format for sudden death baseball, if the game is tied at the end of the regular set of innings, one more inning is played.
If the game is still tied after that, the home team chooses to play offense or defense and a runner is put on first base with no outs.
If the offensive team scores, it wins with no chance for the defense to answer. If the defense does not allow a run, the defensive team wins with no chance to answer.
In the second game, the Oilers came all the way back from a 5-1 deficit and the game was tied at 5 after seven innings. Doubleheaders in the ABL are two seven-inning games.
After neither team scored in the eighth, the Oilers elected to play defense in the sudden death inning.
Ben Haar was up first for the Bucs and bunted back to pitcher Ryan Brown, who threw to second to get the lead runner. Shortstop Owen McElfatrick went for the double play and threw wildly, allowing Haar to move to second base.
Haar then stole third, so the Oilers chose to intentionally walk Cade Lacy and Myles Smith.
Brown struck out Jaxon Sorenson, but then Alex Pendergast walked on four straight pitches to force in Haar and win the game.
The extra inning capped a day when the Oilers came up just short of success.
In the second game, Connor Kershaw had a rough start for the Oilers, allowing five runs on six hits while walking two.
The big blow for the Bucs was a moon shot of a three-run home run by Lex Boedicker, who finished 3 for 4.
Aidan Gonzalez came on in relief for the Oilers and allowed his team to get back in the game with five scoreless innings. Gonzalez gave up four hits while walking one and striking out one.
The Oilers scored a run in the bottom of the third, two in the bottom of the fifth and another in the bottom of the sixth to knot the game.
In the seventh, Peninsula loaded the bases with two outs and Brett Grupe worked a 3-2 count on eventual winner Cameron Crane, but Crane got the strikeout.
Leighton Helfrick was 2 for 4 with three RBIs for the Oilers, while Nick Costello was 2 for 3.
A portentous tone was set for the day in the bottom of the first inning in the first game.
With two outs, Theo Forshey and Ben Griffin singled for the Oilers. Costello then hit a bloop single to left. The throw from left fielder Haar was slightly off line, but catcher Trenton Burkhalter was able to collect the ball and tag out Forshey.
In the top of the third, the Bucs took the lead when Dante Turgeon reached on an error and scored on a double by Haar.
In the top of the fourth, the Bucs got to Ty Correa for another run with a two-out rally. Burkhalter walked, Joey Nerat singled and Turgeon singled to score Burkhalter.
The Oilers battled back in the bottom of the fourth when Costello, who was 2 for 3, led off with a single and Khadim Diaw walked. A fielder’s choice by Michael Elko put runners on the corners.
Bren Wilkinson, who was 2 for 3, singled to score Costello and put Elko on third, but Michael Rodda struck out and McElfatrick flew out to right.
Correa took the loss by giving up the two runs — one earned — in six innings. He gave up four hits while walking two and striking out nine.
Evan Langer had an inning of scoreless relief for the Oilers.
