Dragons lose fourth straight to Fort Wayne

The Dayton Dragons and Lansing Lugnuts both played their opening games of the 2024 season on Friday, Apr. 5 at Day Air Ballpark in downtown Dayton. A crowd of 8,328 were in attendance to witness the Lugnuts defeat the Dragons by a score of 1-0. TOM GILLIAM/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Credit: Tom Gilliam

Credit: Tom Gilliam

The Dayton Dragons and Lansing Lugnuts both played their opening games of the 2024 season on Friday, Apr. 5 at Day Air Ballpark in downtown Dayton. A crowd of 8,328 were in attendance to witness the Lugnuts defeat the Dragons by a score of 1-0. TOM GILLIAM/CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

The Fort Wayne TinCaps broke a 3-3 tie with two runs in the top of the 10th inning and beat the Dayton Dragons 5-3 on Sunday. Fort Wayne won four of six in the series, taking the last four after Dayton won the first two.

For the third straight game, the Dragons took an early lead but could not produce any offense through the middle and late innings as Fort Wayne battled back to win. The Dragons built a 3-0 lead over the first three innings.

In the second, Dayton’s Cade Hunter blasted a solo home run to right field, his second homer of the year, to give the Dragons a 1-0 lead. In the same inning, the Dragons pulled off a double steal with two outs as Yan Contreras scored from third on the back end of the play to make it 2-0. In the third, Cam Collier singled with one out, went to second on a wild pitch, and scored on Hunter’s single to make it 3-0.

Fort Wayne made it 3-2 in the fourth and tied it with a run in the sixth.

Fort Wayne pushed two runs across in the top of the 10th against Dragons reliever Luis Mey (0-1). The Dragons threatened in the bottom of the 10th but came up short.

The Dragons 10-hit attack was led by Hunter, who had two hits and two RBI. Ruben Ibarra was 2 for 4. The Dragons were 1 for 11 with runners in scoring position and left 14 men on base.

Dragons starting pitcher Javi Rivera worked four innings, allowing two runs on three hits with two walks and five strikeouts.

TUESDAY’S GAME

Dayton at Lansing, 6:05 p.m., 980

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