Lawrenceville, GA – Nashville ended a two-game slide in Gwinnett with a 6-3 win over the Stripers on Thursday night. Eddys Leonard was the star of the offense, leaving the yard twice against his former club to help Nashville claim their first game of the six-game set. Logan Henderson was terrific on the mound to start the game with three-plus innings of no-hit ball.
After being held to just two hits in each of the first two games of the series, Nashville pieced together back-to-back hits to start Thursday’s game with Jett Williams and Luis Lara hitting singles off Carlos Carrasco. Though no runs came in the first, Leonard wasted no time in the top of the second. He hit a solo homer on the second pitch he saw in his at-bat to get Nashville on the board.
Henderson struck out the side in order in the bottom of the second and worked around a leadoff walk in the third to strand a runner in scoring position. The Nashville right-hander struck out his fifth of the night to begin the home half of the fourth before turning the ball over to Will Childers after 53 pitches. Childers, the Georgia native, retired both Gwinnett batters he was tasked to face as the game remained 1-0 in favor of Nashville.
Coleman Crow came on in the fifth and allowed consecutive two-out singles to keep Gwinnett at the plate. Those singles helped turn a one-run Sounds advantage into a 3-1 Gwinnett lead after Jim Jarvis homered off the Brewers’ no. 27-rated prospect. Gwinnett made it four straight two-out hits with another single before Crow struck out Rowdy Tellez to get out of his first inning of work.
The right-hander then stranded a pair of Gwinnett baserunners in scoring position in the sixth inning following a leadoff walk and double that placed runners on second and third with no outs to stop Gwinnett from potentially pulling away.
Williams and Lara combined for back-to-back hits once again in the top of the seventh to swing momentum back in Nashville’s favor. After Lara stole second base, both were able to score on a costly two-out Gwinnett throwing error that helped even the score at 3-3. Leonard’s second home run of the game came on a 3-1 pitch in the top of the eighth to once again put Nashville back in front. Crow then spun a 10-pitch three-up, three-down home half of the eighth to fully seize momentum for Nashville.
Lara made it a three-hit night with another single in the top of the ninth and moved to third on a Luke Adams single off Hunter Stratton. The Gwinnett right-hander helped to make it a 5-3 game when he delivered a wild pitch to score Lara and then Greg Jones added an additional insurance run with a RBI single of his own to make it a 6-3 game and four unanswered Nashville runs.
Back out for the ninth and his fifth inning of work, Crow eased through the Stripers lineup to earn his second win of the year. He puncuated the win with a four-pitch strikeout of former Sound Brewer Hicklen for the game’s final out.
Left-hander Robert Gasser (0-0, 0.00 ERA) will make his second appearance of the season for Nashville on Friday night as the Sounds aim to even the series at two games a piece. First pitch is scheduled for 6:05pm from Gwinnett Field.
