Boomers open Frontier League Championship Series vs. Quebec on Wednesday night
Daily Herald news services
The Schaumburg Boomers begin the Frontier League Championship Series on Wednesday night with the first two games in the best-of-five series at Wintrust Field. They'll face the Quebec Capitales.
The Boomers are 11-0 all-time in playoff series counting two wild-card game wins including this year. The team is 2-0 at Wintrust Field thus far in the postseason including a Game 1 victory over the Washington Wild Things last Friday in the opener of the division series.
The Boomers went on to sweep Washington, who won the West Division title during the regular season.
During the division series, the pitching staff struck out 23 batters after fanning a league record 921 during the regular season.
Kristian Scott and Darrell Thompson both appeared in both games of the series. The team hit .300 in the two games as everyone who played recorded at least a hit. Brett Milazzo tripled twice in the series while Chase Dawson finished 4-for-9 with a double and a homer. The Boomers totaled 18 runs and 21 hits in the two contests with 3 homers and 2 steals. Five players drove home multiple runs including four with three.
Quebec boasted a pair of long winning streaks during the year, one of which was ended by the Boomers in the first meeting between the two teams, who met in only one series this year. Quebec took two of three from the Boomers in the first series following the all-star break but a 5-2 victory in the opener ended a 12-game Quebec win streak after it boasted a 13-game streak during the first month of the season.
The Capitales led the East almost the entire year while matching Washington for the best record in the league at 62-34. Quebec lost Game 1 of the divisional series to Ottawa but grinded out a pair of wins at home to capture the series.
Quebec will send the Frontier League's Pitcher of the Year to the mound in the opener in left-hander Miguel Cienfuegos. Cienfuegos was the only pitcher in the league to post an ERA under 2.00 while winning 10 games. The Boomers faced the lefty on July 23 and dropped an 11-2 contest with Cienfuegos allowing just 4 hits in six innings with a walk and seven strikeouts.
Quebec sported the best ERA in the league by over half a point and issued the third fewest walks in the league. The Boomers finished second as a team in walks. The Capitales also boast postseason All-Star Jeffry Parra, a catcher who was one of three players over .300 in the lineup while hitting 32 homers, second in the league, and driving in 83 runs, fifth in the league.
Luis Perez is the Game 1 starter for Schaumburg. Perez started just three games during the regular season but worked five shutout frames in Game 1 of the division series, allowing just 3 hits while striking out four.
The series will shift to Canada for games 3, 4 and 5 if necessary, beginning on Saturday.