Not meant to be for Cougars on home opener

If Anthony Capra was disappointed at getting pulled five innings into a no-hitter, he masked it well.

"Honestly today it didn't matter," said the second-year Kane County Cougar lefty. "I knew in the fourth or fifth inning time was running out on me. I ran into a similar situation in college where I wasn't expecting it and I kind of blew up. I was expecting it today."

Capra departed after five innings and 77 pitches. An inning later the Cougars lost the no-hitter and the shutout, and fell to Burlington 3-2 in Tuesday's home opener in front of 4,632 fans at Elfstrom Stadium.

"It would be fun to extend him, and see how far he could go with (the no-hitter)," first-year Cougars manager Steve Scarsone said, "but at the same time what's the fallout down the road. Cold temperatures, early in the season - I need Cappy for the whole season, or at least as long as we have him here."

Capra, who hails from the same high school in Colorado as Toronto Blue Jays ace Roy Halladay and was a teammate of Kenny Williams, Jr. at Wichita State, was 4-3 with a 4.22 ERA in 10 starts last year for Kane County after getting drafted in the fourth round.

Capra retired the first 13 batters he faced Tuesday until a two-out walk in the fifth. He struck out seven, consistently working ahead in the count and wasn't shy about pitching batters in on a brisk April day.

"Hitters don't really like to hit in the cold weather," Capra said, "so I was trying to attack the zone. That's the Oakland organization's philosophy, is to get strike one and get into your counts."

St. Charles North High School graduate Kenny Smalley relieved Capra in the sixth. After striking out the first two batters he faced Smalley walked Burlington leadoff hitter Patrick Norris. Nick Van Stratten then banged a triple to right to score Norris with the game's first run.

Burlington (1-3) added a pair of unearned runs in the top of the eighth. Kane County made it a 3-2 game in the bottom of the inning on consecutive two-out run-scoring singles by Jason Christian and Steve Kleen.

The Cougars (2-2) saw a golden opportunity to break out to an early lead go by the wayside in the first. David Thomas and Dusty Coleman singled to start things off and put runners on the corners, but a strikeout and double play snuffed out the threat. Kane County left two more runners on base in the second. A Franklin Hernandez single in the fourth was the Cougars' only other baserunner until the eighth.