SPRINGFIELD, MA- Nathan Borges (Brooklin, ON), Luke Manuel (Surrey, BC) and Brodie Harkness (Bowmanville, ON) limited the Strike Zone Selects to only one hit to lead the Junior National Team to a 10-0 win in the first game of the New England Summer Tour.
With two out in the bottom of the eighth, Strike Zone Selects broke the no-hit bid with an opposite field single to right field off Harkness.
Harkness had retired five straight up until that point after taking over for Luke Manuel to start the bottom of the seventh.
In total, Borges, Manuel and Harkness struck out 12 batters with Borges counting for two, Manuel fanning seven and Harkness striking out three.
After failing to score a run in the first two innings, the juniors broke-out with four in the top of the third highlighted by an RBI double from Mitch Bigras (Sarnia, ON) and a two-run double off the bat of Jake Lumley (Windsor, ON).
JD Osborne (Whitby, ON) led off the inning with a single to right and scored when Bigras laced a double into the gap in left field.
After Lumley’s double scored two, Toby Handley (Whitby, ON) picked up the third double and fourth junior hit of the frame to make the score 4-0.
Borges allowed a walk in the bottom of the first and Strike Zone Selects put runners on the corners after an error at short only to see him get out of the inning with a ground out.
The right-hander went onto retire six straight on two fly-outs, two ground outs and two strike outs to end his three inning outing.
Luke Manuel took over in the fourth and was simply dominant during his three innings of work allowing only a walk that came in the fourth, while striking out seven out of the ten batters he faced.
After adding two runs in the fourth off an RBI single from Bigras and a sac-fly from newcomer Charles Leblanc (Laval, QC), the juniors scored runs in both the fifth and seventh to go up by eight.
Jake Lumley picked up his third RBI of the game with a single in the seventh to go along with a 2-for-3 day at the plate.
Mitch Bigras also had a 2-for-3 day at the plate and collected two RBI, while Toby Handley and JD Osborne had two hits apiece.
Notes: The juniors will enjoy a day at historic Fenway Park tomorrow where they will take batting practice in the hitting tunnels and also get the use of bullpen mounds during the morning…The afternoon includes a meet and greet with Boston Red Sox starting pitcher and Gibsons, BC native Ryan Dempster and the chance to watch big-league batting practice before taking in the Red Sox vs. San Diego Padres match-up in the evening…The juniors will be back on the field on July 4th with a 6pm ET contest against the Boston Selects at LeLacheur Park in Lowell…Ben Onyshko (Winnipeg, MB) is scheduled to start for the JNT…Please follow @baseballcanada and @team_c_updates on Twitter to stay up-to-date on all the news and in game updates with the Junior National Team while in New England.
