Chicago Dogs suffer narrow defeat on the road to Lake Country
OCONOMOWOC, Wis. — The Lake Country DockHounds defeated the Chicago Dogs 4-3 Wednesday night at Wisconsin Brewing Company Park.
The loss drops Chicago to 3-2 on the season.
The Dogs recorded 11 hits against the DockHounds, including a hit in every inning, but left 12 runners on base in the loss. Jason Bilous took the mound for his second start as a Chicago Dog and lasted 4⅓ innings and allowed three earned runs.
Bilous was dominant for a vast majority of his outing. He faced the minimum batters through three innings, before allowing hits to the first three DockHounds in the bottom of the fourth. Lake Country shortstop Josh Altmann hit a 3-run home run to left field to open the scoring.
Following Altmann’s blast, Bilous struck out the next three DockHounds. Bilous recorded six strikeouts in his start.
The Dogs quickly tied the game two innings later. In the fifth inning, second baseman Brantley Bell hit his first home run as Dog — a 2-run blast — to shrink Lake Country’s lead. The Dogs led the sixth inning with three consecutive singles to load the bases with zero outs but only came up with one run.
Pavin Parks grounded out to Altmann, which scored first baseman Jacob Teter. The Dogs put constant pressure on Lake Country’s pitching staff and defense in the following innings but couldn’t bring any runs across.
Matt Walker dominated in his 3⅔ innings out of the bullpen for Chicago. He tossed 3⅔ innings, only allowed one hit, one run and struck out three DockHounds.
Walker issued his only walk to Lake Country center fielder Justin Connell to lead off the bottom of the eighth inning. Walker made an errant throw to first base toward Connell, who advanced to third on the error and eventually scored the DockHounds’ fourth run on Cesar Izturis Jr’s single.
Chicago put additional pressure on Lake Country closer Alexis Rivero in the ninth inning. Three of the first four Chicago hitters reached to start the inning, but the Dogs failed to score the game-tying run.
Chicago and Lake Country will play the series finale at Wisconsin Brewing Company Park at 11:05 a.m. Thursday.