Yorkville: Hounds Cruise into Playoffs

Wink rounds the bases on his 1st home run.

After our most exhilarating victory of the season last time out, it was a quick turnaround for our next and final game of the regular season. The city was still in the throes of a stifling heat wave, the temperature reaching 104 degrees. The location was the Great Lawn, and Central Park was understandably much less crowded than normal. We knew that regardless of the opponent, a tough game would lay ahead. In the other dugout was a team with the catchy name of WTAS. After the pleasantries were exchanged between the two managers, it was time to play ball. 

Jane up to bat.

Cap is fired up.

As the home team, we took the field first behind Amy, who was making her first start of this Yorkville season. She pitched a scoreless first and now it was our turn to bat. JT set the tone with a leadoff double, and our offense was off and running with a 7-run inning. Wink's 3-run home run to the right center gap capped the rally. Amy got into some trouble in the 2nd, surrendering 5 runs, but getting out of the inning with the Hounds still in the lead. We added 3 to our tally in the bottom of the frame, and for the top of the 3rd, Wink came on in relief. The Winkster was effective out there, working quickly and giving up only one walk in his 5 innings of work. Meanwhile, our offense continued to tack on runs– 3 in the 4th, and 3 in the 5th. The offensive standouts were JT(4-4, 3 RS), Jane(2-4, 2 RBI, RS), Pat(2-2, BB, 4 RBI, 2 RS), Karim (3-3, 2 RBI, 2 RS), and Wink, who went yard for a second time in the 5th, another 3-run job. It was a 3-3 game for him, and if you add that to his pitching, it was an MVP-type performance from Wink. Entering WTAS' last licks, they were down by 9 runs and victory wasn't in doubt. They scored two meaningless runs before Wink closed the game out, a grounder to first the final play of the game. Final Score: Hounds 16, WTAS 9. The one downer out of this one is that Pat turned his ankle on a close play at first and had to come out of the game. We hope it's not too serious and that you can get back to mashing ASAP, Pat.

We have officially closed the book on the regular season. Our undefeated record is a testament to our will to win. We won games even when we weren't at our best. We won by blowout and we won close ones. We had two walk-off wins. We should be proud of this accomplishment, but we must also remember it will all be for naught if we do not capture the ultimate prize. I am confident that we can step our game up even further in the playoffs.

(scoresheet after the jump)

(click to enlarge)