Leitch Propels Monarchs to Sixth-Series Win

Kansas City, KS — After an hour and a half rain delay, it was a duel between the Monarchs and the Railcats in the rubber match on Sunday afternoon. Kansas City came up on top with a 5-2 win behind an RBI double from Ryan Leitch in the eighth frame.

The Monarchs picked up where they left off last night when Grant Richardson connected on the first pitch of his at bat and cranked a shot the opposite way. It was back-to-back games where KC homered in the first frame. Richardson talks about his homer and says, “It was great, I was just trying to keep myself at a two-strike count and it helped that I swung at the first pitch and made good contact. I think it was a good way to start the rally for the game and a really good way to carry over the rally from yesterday.”

Gary tied up the game in the fourth after Camryn Williams singled with a runner on base. Jake Guenther grounded out into an RBI to bring in Williams. Shortly after in the fifth inning, the Railcats took their first lead of the contest when Korry Howell reached based via fielders choice. This brought in Elvis Peralta who laced a ball into right field to bring home Howell from first. The Railcats had their first and only lead of the afternoon.

Just an inning later, Richardson continued a hot start at the plate with a double into left field. After smith walked, they both stole a base to bring up Austin Callahan. He sent a chopper past the glove of the second baseman to score both the runners and the Monarchs retook the lead. The Fremont, NE recorded a timely two-run RBI and tacked on ninth of the year.

Jacob Gomez got the start, but Ryan Garcia came on the mound in the fifth inning. He gave up three hits and notched seven strikeouts to hold Gary to zero runs. Ryan talks about the game plan going into it, “The game plan going in was (to start), but rain came and we took precautionary measures just in case we didn’t have to burn a start. We saw that there was no rain coming so I went out of the bullpen and went from there.”

It was a 3-2 game in the bottom of the eighth and Kansas City was looking to add on insurance runs to pull away from the contest. Thats exactly what they did when Smith walked for the second time and Hudson Head singled. The catcher and returning Monarch, Ryan Leitch made the biggest swing of the afternoon. With two outs and facing a 2-2 count, he smashed a ball into the left center field gap to bring home both the runners.

Kansas City held on in the ninth inning and finished the home stand 7-2 to win their sixth series in a row. They improve to 14-7 and remain in first place in the west division. This red hot team will hit the road and open up with an away stand at Fargo on Tuesday night. It will be a 7:02 at Newman Outdoor Field.