Kari Gibb/MDN Minot State University redshirt freshman and Hot Tot pitcher Ayden Sauerbrei worked on the mound Sunday, July 7, against the St. Cloud Rox at Corbett Field.

The Minot Hot Tots played the Bismarck Larks on the road Saturday, July 6, and faced the St. Cloud Rox at home on Sunday, July 7, at Corbett Field. The Hot Tots would win on the road and drop the home game to the Rox.

Minot had six strikeouts at home on Sunday and $50.00 per strikeout was added to the July donation bucket by Blue Cross, Blue Shield of North Dakota. They will keep adding to the bucket with each home game strikeout until the end of the month.

The Hot Tots will host the Rox for game two today, July 8, at Corbett Field.

St. Cloud Rox 14,

Hot Tots 8

The St. Cloud Rox scored in five of the nine innings compared to Minot scoring in three of the nine to take the first win in the Rox two game visit to Minot. St. Cloud posted three runs at the top of the second inning, six runs at the top of the third inning and a pair of runs at the top of both the fourth and sixth innings enroute to the win.

Minot was scoreless until the bottom of the fifth inning of play. Trailing 11-0, the Tots Brant Baughcum started the inning with a single to center. One out later, Jonah Shields hit a singled that scored Baughcum who had stolen second base during the at bat.

Anthony Potestio shook the dust off the previous four innings with a home run that scored Shields.

Adrian Dominguez was hit by a pitch to take his place on first base. With two outs, Evan Dempsey singled to right. Abe Affholter singled to center to score Dominguez. Caid Bergthold singled to left and scored Dempsey to narrow the Rox lead to 11-5 to end the inning.

The Hot Tots would score another run at the bottom of the seventh inning to give St. Cloud the 13-6 lead going into the scoreless eighth inning for both teams. The Rox would add one more run at the top of the ninth inning for the 14-6 lead and the last chance for Minot to score eight runs to tie the game and force extra innings.

Dominguez would start the ninth inning with a singled to center and Blake Penso would follow that with a double to center that scored Dominguez. Dempsey would hit his own double to right to score Penso for the second run of the inning. The next would all hit into defended plays to shut down the comeback effort.

Minot was 14-for-39 at the plate with two errors as a team in the game. Bergthold was 3-for-4 batting with a pair of RBIs. Potestio, Dominguez, Dempsey and Affholter each had two hits as well. All but one batter in the lineup had at least one hit in the game.

Ayden Sauerbrei pitched two and one-third innings and allowed nine runs- six earned- with six hits, walked two batters, had three strikeouts and one home run. Quinn Hocom pitched three and one-third innings and allowed four runs on three hits, walked seven batters and had one strikeout. Drew Maust pitched one and one-third innings while Keanu Jacobs-Guishard pitched two innings and allowed one run and no hits in relief.

St. Cloud was 9-for-33 batting with one error as a team in the win. Andrew Savage was a perfect 3-for-3 at the plate with three RBIs and scored one run. Carter Hanson was 2-for-3, added an RBI and scored three runs in the game.

Phil Brennaman pitched five innings and allowed five runs on ten hits, walked one batter, had five strikeouts and allowed one home run. Owen Marsh pitched two innings and allowed one run on one hit. Kevin Figueredo pitched two innings and allowed two runs on three hits in relief.

Hot Tots 14,

Bismarck Larks 13

Minot used offensive effort to score runs at the top of the third, fifth, seventh and ninth innings to claim the one point win over Bismarck.

Nick Alonso started the third inning by being walked and stole second when Keanu Jacobs-Guishard was walked. Anthony Potestio was walked to load the bases. Abe Affholter hit a single to center field and advanced to second base while Alonso and Jacobs-Guishard scored to trail the Larks 3-2 at the end of the third inning.

With Bismarck leading 8-2 after four innings, the Hot Tots mounted a six run inning to tie the game.

With one out, Potestio singled to get on base. Adrian Dominguez was walked for runners on first and second base. Adam Berghult singled to score Potestio. Evan Dempsey doubled to center field and scored Dominguez and Berghult. Brant Baughcum reached first on error and Dempsey would score on a single by Jack Matousek. Alanos then singled to left and scored Baughcum.

The Larks switched pitchers and with two outs, Jacobs-Guishard singled to score Matousek to give the game an 8-8 score.

Bismarck would add one run at the bottom of the fifth and two at the bottom of the sixth to lead 11-8 going into the seventh inning.

In the seventh, after a double play, Jacobs-Guishard and Potestio were both walked. Bismarck swapped pitchers again at this point. Affholter doubled to right to score Jacobs-Guishard and Potestio. Dominguez singled three pitches later to score Affholter and tie the game at 11-11 at the middle of the seventh inning.

Bismarck added two runs at the bottom of the seventh inning of play and neither team scored in the eighth inning.

At the top of the ninth inning, Affholter singled to left and Dominguez did the same to put runners on first and second. Berghult was hit by a pitch to load the bases.

Dempsey was down 1-2 in the pitch count and tripled on the fourth pitch thrown to score Affholter, Dominguez and Berghult to take the 14-13 lead.

With one out, Larks’ Cesar Franco was walked, Michael Davinni was hit by a pitch before Tanner Mueller struck out the final two batters- one swinging and one looking- to give the Hot Tots the win.

Minot was 14-for-39 at the plate with two errors as a team. Affholter and Dempsey were 3-for-6 with eight RBIs between the two. Dominguez was 2-for-4 and Alonso was 2-for-5 and each had an RBI in the win. All but one Hot Tot had hits in the game.

Thomas Leiden pitched three innings and allowed five runs on two hits. Griffin Webb pitched one inning and allowed three runs- none earned- on one hit. Hudson Yarbrough pitched two-thirds of an inning while Jacob Mallozzi pitched one and one-third innings and allowed two runs on five hits. Kaden Arn pitched one inning and allowed two runs on three hits while Mueller pitched two innings in relief.

Bismarck was 11-for-41 batting with three errors as a team. Davinni was 3-for-4 at the plate with an RBI in the loss. Noah Leib was 3-for-5 with four RBIs and Ryan Rivera was 2-for-5 batting. Leib is batting .600 on the season thus far. Bismarck used six pitchers as well in the game.