Back from the Expedition League All-Star break, the Souris Valley Sabre Dogs resumed their regular season schedule Thursday evening on the road against the Sioux Falls Sunfish. It was the first of four straight meetings at Karras Park.

As it turned out, it would be a silent night at the outset offensively for the Dogs. Things got off to an inauspicious beginning as Souris Valley found themselves trailing 5-0 after four full innings. The Dogs finally broke the ice in the fifth thanks to a sacrifice fly by Allen Grier to trim the deficit to 5-1. Unfortunately for the Sabre Dogs, they allowed two more runs in the home half of the eighth to fall further behind 8-1.

In their last chance at the plate, the Sabre Dogs managed to load the bases with two men down. Grier worked the count full before being issued a base on balls to drive in his second run of the game. In the next at-bat, Taylor Justus worked another walk for the Sabre Dogs with the bags full to bring the score to 8-3. After a Sun Fish pitching substitution, Souris Valley’s hopes of a late game comeback ended on a Drew Miller strikeout to close out the game and leave the bases loaded.

Starting pitcher Shane Sinclair took the loss for the Sabre Dogs as he struggled through three and two-thirds innings while allowing five earned runs. Offensively, Souris Valley mustered just three hits compared to nine for the Sun Fish.

Souris Valley plans to play the second of four games against Sioux Falls on Friday evening at 6:35 p.m.