INDIANAPOLIS – The Indianapolis Indians (38-29/69-73) came back to beat the Omaha Storm Chasers (31-34/64-75) on Friday night, 3-1. Vince Velasquez pitched 6.0 scoreless innings and Drew Waters went 3-for-3 from the plate, but Omaha couldn’t hold on to a one-run lead in the loss.
Neither team scored for the first four innings, with Omaha starter Vince Velasquez firing a 1-2-3 bottom of the 2nd inning and allowing just one single in each of the 1st, 3rd and 4th innings.
The Storm Chasers were first to score, pushing across a run in the top of the 5th inning on an RBI single from Maikel Garcia to give Omaha a 1-0 lead.
Velasquez came back with a perfect bottom of the 5th inning and negated a one-out error with a double play to face the minimum in the bottom of the 6th inning, finishing his night going 6.0 scoreless innings, striking out 6 and allowing just 3 hits in his second consecutive quality start.
Mason Black (0-3) relieved Velasquez for the bottom of the 7th inning and induced a double play that allowed the tying run to cross home, tying the game 1-1.
Omaha called back on Black for the bottom of the 8th inning, but he surrendered a two-run home run to give the Indians a 3-1 lead and the Storm Chasers went down in order in the top of the 9th inning, finishing the 2-run loss.
The Indians will host the Storm Chasers again on Saturday evening for the fifth game of the series at Victory Field. First pitch is scheduled for 5:35 P.M. CT and Lucas Braun is in line to start for Omaha.