Having dispatched the three-peating 121-win Surprise Zombies in the Wild Card game, Sewell's reward was to face the other 121-win FL Central Team in the Division Series. Would they continue on as giant killers?
Game 1: With Tenaka tired from the Wild Card game, Sewell turned to Maeda to face Scherzer in game 1. Mookie Betts puts SFE on the board first with a solo homer, but Logan Morrison promptly tied it up with a shot of his own. Sewell turned the game over to their deadly Osuna/Kimbrel closing tandem while the Geckos stuck with their ace....which looked like a bad call when defense-only Zach Cozart blasted his own homer to give Sewell a 2-1 lead, which they kept to take the first game of the series.
Game 2: Sewell did not treat Rich Hill well, with Flores and Calhoun both smashing two-run homers. Braun and Descalso added an RBI each. The Santa Fe offense sputtered its way to a pair of runs but never seriously threatened against the Tadpoles' early lead, and SEW won 6-0 to take a 2-game lead in the series with the games going back to Sewell.
Game 3: Braun homered in the first to give Sewell an early lead but the Santa Fe bats finally woke up in the 5th and 6th to take a 5-1 lead behind RBI hits from LuCroy and Betts. After a parade of short relief appearances led to a couple of SEW runs, Dan Otero tosses 2 1/3 innings to complete the 5-3 victory and get a win for the Geckos.
Game 4: LuCroy homered and added a second RBI while Scherzer dominated in 8 innings, allowing only a single run on a Scooter Gennett 2-out RBI single. Seung-Hwan Oh nailed down the save and Scherzer is now 1-1 in 2-1 games and the Division Series is back to a best-of-three.
Game 5: This was the game where each team had to start someone they didn't have a lot of confidence in, and that led to a combined 12 2/3 relief innings. But the SFE squad had more luck on this day and ultimately prevailed 11-1. The series returned to Santa Fe, with the fans wondering if a home team would win a game this series.
Game 6: Donaldson hit a two-run homer in the first inning and added another run in the second. Hill pitched out of trouble for 5 innings and Otero and Oh combined to allow only a single run to let SFE take the series 4 games to 2.
Jonathan LuCroy was named Series MVP, hitting .294 with 2 homer and 4 RBI, all in big situations.
Congrats to Kevin for Sewell having a great year and for being the one to finally vanquish the villains of Surprise after their three years of domination.
