THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, July 8, 1994 TAG: 9407080779
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KIMBALL CROSSLEY, CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE: PAWTUCKET LENGTH: Medium: 59 lines
The Norfolk Tides probably wish they could schedule more games against the Pawtucket Red Sox.
The Tides completed their domination of the team with the best record in the International League on Thursday night with an error-aided 6-3 victory. It gave Norfolk a 9-5 edge in the season series, which, unfortunately for the Tides, is over.
``They beat us pretty bad our first time in here,'' Tides manager Bobby Valentine said. ``Since then we've been fortunate against them. We've had a lot of big innings against them. Usually when you have a big inning, you get a break in the middle, and we've been getting them.''
For the second straight night, the Tides took advantage of Pawtucket fielding errors to make a late-inning comeback. The Tides were trailing 3-2 with no one out in the top of the seventh when shortstop Jose Munoz let a sure double-play ball roll through his legs.
After a sacrifice bunt moved the runners into scoring position, third baseman Mike Sharperson committed a double error on Joe Kmak's routine grounder to third. Two runs scored to give Norfolk a 4-3 lead, and Kmak, who had three hits, advanced to second.
Rick Parker then chased Dan Gakeler (0-1) with a single to center, which moved Kmak to third.
Doug Dascenzo greeted Don Florence with a perfect suicide-squeeze bunt, and Aaron Ledesma followed with his third single of the night to conclude the scoring.
The rally made a winner out of Frank Seminara (2-3), who survived early trouble to go seven solid innings.
``It wasn't pretty or dominating,'' Valentine said of Seminara's seven-hit, two-walk performance.
Seminara gave up two runs on three hits in the first inning and a solo homer to Paul Thoutsis in the fourth. The only other inning in which the righthander had trouble was the seventh, as he walked the leadoff batter on four pitches and went to 3-and-1 on the next batter, Scott Hatteberg. But after working the count full, Seminara got Hatteberg to hit into a double play, ending the threat.
Eric Gunderson tossed the final two innings, giving up one hit, for his first save of the season.
The Tides trailed 3-0 heading into the sixth inning and had just two hits to that point. But Kmak singled to lead off the inning, and two outs later Ledesma and Shawn Hare each posted RBI singles to cut the Pawtucket lead to 3-2.
NOTES: Norfolk travels today to Syracuse, where Joe Roa (5-3, 3.41) gets the nod. The Chiefs have yet to name their starter. . . . The Tides have hit 13 of their last 15 home runs on the road. . . . Despite being outhit by their opponents by 29 hits this season, the Tides have outscored the opposition by 35 runs. by CNB