Blake Burkhalter entered the ninth inning with a one-run lead and the bottom of Indianapolis’ order due up. Three batters later, the tying runs were in scoring position. Two batters after that, the Stripers’ four-run cushion had vanished completely.
Indianapolis scored twice against Burkhalter in the ninth and completed a five-run comeback, handing Gwinnett a 6-5 loss Wednesday at Gwinnett Field.
Tyler Callihan opened the inning with a line-drive single to right, and Nick Cimillo walked. Derek Berg’s sacrifice bunt moved both runners over before Mitch Jebb lifted a fly ball to medium left field. Luke Williams made the catch and threw home, but Callihan slid in safely with the tying run.
Burkhalter was one out from preserving the tie when Duce Gourson hit a ground ball toward first. The ball skipped off David McCabe’s glove, and Gourson beat the play as Cimillo scored from third. Burkhalter struck out Jesus Castillo to finish the inning, but the damage was done: two earned runs, a blown save and the loss.
Noah Murdock needed little time to close it. Rowdy Tellez, Jim Jarvis and Lizandro Espinoza each grounded out in the bottom of the ninth, leaving Gwinnett with a defeat that had seemed remote three innings earlier.
The Stripers led 5-1 after six, built on Brett Wisely’s two-run homer and Maverick Handley’s two-run double. Wisely finished 2-for-4 with a homer, a double and two RBIs. Handley doubled, walked twice and drove in two.
Gourson had supplied the game’s first hit and run in the fourth, turning on an up-and-in fastball from Brett Sears and sending it high onto the lawn beyond right-center field. Gwinnett answered in the bottom half. After Jordan Groshans walked, Wisely drove a 1-2 pitch deep to right, beyond Robert Hassell III’s retreat, for a two-run homer and a 2-1 lead.
Handley walked to begin the fifth, advanced on Kevin Kilpatrick Jr.’s sacrifice bunt and scored when Jarvis dropped a soft liner into left. The Stripers stretched the margin again in the sixth. Wisely doubled, Cal Conley walked and Handley drove a ball toward the left-center gap. Callihan made a diving attempt, but the ball glanced off his glove. Wisely scored, and Conley came all the way around from first for a 5-1 advantage.
Indianapolis relievers Landon Tomkins and Murdock combined for 3 1/3 scoreless innings after that. Gwinnett put two runners aboard against Tomkins in the seventh but failed to score, then went down in order in each of the final two innings.
The Indians began cutting into the lead before Sears could finish the seventh. Hassell and Jack Brannigan reached on singles, and both advanced on Callihan’s groundout. Luis Vargas replaced Sears, and Cimillo greeted him with a two-run double to left. After a strikeout, Jebb chopped a ball to Jarvis at short. Jarvis’ low throw escaped McCabe and went into the dugout, allowing Cimillo to score and reducing the lead to 5-4.
The error was Gwinnett’s only one of the game. Jarvis also went 1-for-4 with a walk and an RBI.
Vargas stopped the rally there and worked through the eighth, recording five outs without allowing an earned run and striking out three. Sears was charged with three earned runs over 6 1/3 innings, with eight strikeouts and one walk.
Gourson finished 2-for-4 with a home run, a walk and the deciding RBI single. His first hit put Indianapolis ahead early. His last finished the Stripers’ late collapse.