South Bend Cubs rough up Cougars 10-2

The Kane County Cougars (29-10, 65-42) grabbed a hit much earlier in Wednesday's game, but fell to the South Bend Cubs (19-20, 48-58) by a score of 10-2 at Four Winds Field.

Victor Reyes helped the Cougars to strike first with a 2-run single in the second inning, but the offense did not find the scoreboard again the rest of the game.

Markus Solbach (9-4) suffered the loss despite the right-hander's 13th quality start of the season.

South Bend first scored with and RBI groundout in the bottom of the second and tied up the game with another RBI grounder in the third. Two frames later, the Cougars were nearly out of the inning, but an error by Marty Herum allowed the go-ahead run to score and later helped South Bend grab a 2-run advantage on former Cougar David Bote's RBI hit.

The Cubs ended up scoring in six of the eight frames they batted in and piled together 10 unanswered runs.

Solbach finished the day with 6 innings of 5-run, 3-earned, baseball. Arizona Diamondbacks' fifth round draft pick Ryan Burr made his Cougar debut giving up a run in the seventh.

South Bend's final nail in the coffin was a 4-run eighth inning off of Chris Oliver, highlighted by a bases clearing triple from former Cougar Jeffrey Baez.

After Reyes' two-run single, the Cougars offense was again stifled by South Bend's starting pitching as Trevor Clifton (4-9) tossed seven innings of two-run baseball with three strikeouts and stranding eight batters.

The Cougars and Cubs finish the series on Thursday. Left-hander Josh Taylor (2-1, 1.67) will take the mound against South Bend's Tommy Thorpe (3-5, 3.67). First pitch is scheduled for 6:05 p.m.