Late Inning Rally Pushes Patriots Past Curve

Altoona, Pennsylvania – The Somerset Patriots (20-11) defeated the Altoona Curve (14-17) by a score of 8-7 at Peoples Natural Gas Field on Saturday evening.

Trailing 5-4 in the seventh, the Patriots rallied for four runs to take the lead. Three of the runs came in the ninth inning on a game-tying homer by Max Burt (2), a Derek Dietrich double and a sacrifice fly by Michael Beltre to take an 8-6 lead.

A Liover Peguero triple scored Tucupita Marcano to put Altoona up early in the first.

Somerset answered with three runs in the second on a Jesus Bastidas RBI double and a two-run homer by Rodolfo Duran (2) for a 3-1 lead.

Aaron Shackelford (4) then hit a two-run homer to tie up the game at 3-3 in the second.

The Curve took a 6-3 lead in the fourth on another Marcano triple, a sacrifice fly by Nick Gonzales and a wild pitch that scored Matt Fraizer.

Dietrich then drove home Anthony Volpe with an infield single in the fifth and made it a one-run ballgame with a solo home run (7) in the seventh. Dietrich finished the game 3-for-5 with a run and three RBI.

Peguero plated the last run of the game in the ninth on an RBI single for the 8-7 final.

Josh Maciejewski (1-0) picked up the win with five strikeouts over 4.1 scoreless innings pitched. Nick Ernst (2) earned the save after he allowed a run in 0.2 innings pitched.

Tahnaj Thomas (2-3) suffered the loss after he allowed three runs on three hits in an inning pitched.

The 2022 Somerset Patriots Season presented by Ford will continue on the road on Sunday with an 1:00 p.m. game versus the Curve at Peoples Natural Gas Field. Fans can catch all the action on FOX Sports New Jersey 93.5 FM | 1450 AM, the Flagship Station for Patriots Baseball.