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Comeback Cougars avoid sweep

In a wild turn of events, the Kane County Cougars (38-17, 73-49) climbed back from a 7-run deficit to beat the Quad Cities River Bandits (34-21, 79-44) by a score of 10-9 on Sunday afternoon.

The Cougars grabbed their first lead of the series since Friday in the bottom of the eighth inning. Down 9-7, Henry Castillo's run-scoring single brought the Cougars within one and put the tying and go-ahead runners on. Marty Herum then launched a game-deciding 2-run double to right center field plating Cody Regis and Castillo for a 10-9 lead. Zach Davis (0-1) was charged with the loss and the blown save.

Zac Curtis took the mound in search of his 29th save of the season and did not make things easy by putting the first two runners in scoring position with one out. Curtis slammed the door on Quad Cities inducing a ground ball back to the mound off the bat of Drew Ferguson and getting Jason Martin to ground out to first.

Down 8-1 after the top of the second inning, the Cougars chipped away and they scored 3 runs in the second helped by RBI singles from Ildemaro Vargas and Castillo.

Joe Munoz scored Marty Herum on a 2-out single in the fifth, before Vargas launched his second home run of the season taking Brock Dykxhoorn deep in the sixth.

Hector Hernandez stopped the bleeding in the second as he came in for relief of Josh Taylor. The Cougars' bullpen kept them in the game as Ryan Burr (1-0) picked up his first Cougar win stranding two runners in scoring position through two scoreless frames.

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