Dayton, Ohio – The Quad Cities River Bandits (63-52, 33-19) struck for their third-straight three-home run game Sunday and secured their fifth win in six contests against the Dayton Dragons (60-58, 21-31) 12-3 at Day Air Ballpark.
Before blasting his second long ball of the series later in the afternoon, Ben North staked the Bandits and starter David Shields to a 1-0 lead in the second, driving in Chris Brito with an RBI-single.
An Esmith Pineda homer and a run on a wild pitch allowed Dayton to jump ahead 2-1 in the bottom of the third, but they would prove the only tallies surrendered by Shields, as the southpaw struck out over 5.0 innings of two-run ball.
Quad Cities outscored the Dragons 11-1 over the final two-thirds of the game and immediately knotted the score 2-2 on Austin Charles’ solo shot in the fourth, the infielder’s second in as many games.
Asbel Gonzalez put the River Bandits in front for good in the fifth with an RBI-double.
While Hyungchan Um’s two-run triple was Quad Cities’ only hit of the sixth inning, the Bandits took advantage of four Bryce Archie walks, a wild pitch, and four Dragons errors to extend their advantage to 7-2 during the frame.
North made it 8-2 Quad Cities in the eighth with a solo shot off Jimmy Romano, the shortstop’s fourth home run in his last six games.
After Jackson Cleveland worked a pair of scoreless innings in relief of Shields, Dayton scored for the final time in the eighth, plating an unearned run against Aiden Jimenez on Eric Becker’s RBI-groundout. Jimenez finished the game with a pair of strikeouts and followed Cleveland’s effort with 2.0 innings of his own.
Quad Cities got the tally back and then some with a four-run ninth against Trent Hodgdon, including the 11th home run of the season from Tyriq Kemp and an RBI-single courtesy of Jose Cerice. A wild pitch and Erick Torres’s RBI-groundout got the Bandits out to the 12-3 advantage.
Shields (10-5) earned his team-leading 10th win of the season for Quad Cities, while Ovis Portes (1-8), who faced just two batters and allowed one run before leaving with an injury, was tagged with the loss.
With their win and Cedar Rapids’ 7-1 victory over Beloit Sunday, the River Bandits head into their final homestand of the season atop the Midwest League West division and host the second-place Sky Carp for game one of a six-game set Tuesday, August 25. First pitch is set for 6:30 p.m.