Hollanders Ride the Roller Coaster

The past three games have brought all kinds of ups and downs. Last Friday night's game was Cologne's annual Fill the Hill night. The Hollanders faced off against the hot Young America Cardinals. The Cardinals had their work cut out for them as Christian Johnson took the mound again for Cologne. After Christian set down the side in the top of the first the Hollanders would draw the first blood in the bottom half. Casey Clemensen would start off with a lead off single. Anthony Brenner would push Casey to second with a walk and Tim Swanson would put up the first run as he hit a two out RBI single to plate Casey. Young America would tie the game in the top of the fourth after a string of hits, but Cologne responded by putting up five runs in the bottom. Joey Lilya started the inning (and his big night) with a single. Brandon Fritz would draw a walk. Casey would load the bases with a single. Tanner Luebke then hit an RBI single, followed by Carter Clemensen's RBI hit-by-pitch, and Brenner hit an RBI single. The Cardinals scored one more in the fifth, but Cologne, yet again, responded with two. The bottom of the fifth started with a couple of bangs as Lilya and Jon Kummer hit back to back triples. Christian then made a quick sixth inning of the Cardinal hitters, and then Cologne added one more in the seventh as Brenner and Swanson hit back to back singles. Lilya rounded off his night with an RBI double. Young America was able to squeeze one more run out of Christian in the seventh. After pitching seven great innings Christian gave up the ball to Kyle Twait. Twait finished up the game not allowing any more runs. It was a complete team effort as the Hollanders topped the Cardinals by a score of nine to three. The big night was Joey Lilya, who was just a homerun away from the cycle and he sure tried for it. Lilya ended the night with three hits (single, double, and triple) with two runs scored and one RBI. Brenner also got three hits including one double. Casey Clemensen got two hits inluding two runs scored and one RBI. Tanner Luebke, Tim Swanson, Torben Urdahl,  and Jon Kummer all got one hit. Christian did great work against a very good hitting Cardinals team. He gave up only three runs (1 earned) while giving up only five hits and striking out eight and more importantly he picked up his third win of the season.

With Cologne riding high after their big win Friday night, the Hollanders played Green Isle Sunday afternoon. What to say about this game? In a nut shell, we will not speak at great lengths about this one. It was just one of those games were the Hollanders couldn't do much right, but the Irish couldn't do anything wrong. The Irish bats were alive as they racked up 24 runs off of 22 hits. Yowza! If we have to find something nice out of the pile that was this game it was that Carter Clemensen got four RBIs off of three hits. Can we just leave it at that and continue? We will...

The Green Isle game must've lit a big fire underneath the Hollanders, because the boys came out Tuesday night pedal to the metal. The midweek show down saw Cologne travel to Hamburg. This game started just like the game against Green Isle except that it was Cologne's turn to pour it on. The Hollanders busted it open in the top of the first inning by scoring nine runs. The game started with Tanner and Casey both drawing walks. Carter and Cole Pengilly hit back to back RBI singles. Kyle Brazil loaded the bases with a single to left. Brenner hit a sac fly to right that scored Carter. Tim Swanson hit an RBI single. Kummer walked. Brandon Fritz kept it going with an RBI single. Tanner brought in a run by getting hit with a pitch. Casey then proceeded to get an RBI with a single. Carter topped off the inning and picked up two more RBIs with a single. Cologne kept adding more over the next few innings. They scored one run in the second after singles by Brazil and Brenner and a sacrifice fly from Kummer, and one more run in the third after a Luebke triple and Casey RBI. If 11 runs wasn't enough, the Hollanders put up five more in the fourth. Brazil started the inning with a lead off double, Brenner walked, Kummer singled, Fritz scored Brazil with an RBI infield single, Austin Pysick scored Brenner with a sacrifice fly, Casey singled, and then Lilya cleared all the bases with a three RBI triple. As good as the offense looked, Alex Eichner looked just as good on the mound. After giving up one unearned run in the first, Eichner settled in and didn't give the Hawks any real chance to come back. Eichner pitched all seven innings giving up just the one unearned run off of only five hits, two strikeouts, and only throwing 85 pitches. Kyle Brazil returned to the lineup after his time on the DL and didn't miss a beat as he got three hits. The Clemensen Clan got two hits a piece along with two hits each from Tim Swanson, Brandon Fritz and Jon Kummer. Tanner Luebke, Joey Lilya, Cole Pengilly, and Anthony Brenner all got one hit during the game. With the Hollanders finally at full-strength it appears that Cologne will be a very tough team to beat down the stretch and should be a lot of fun watching.

With the past all written up, it's time to look forward. The game versus New Germany has been rescheduled for this Friday night (6/21) along with this year's FIREWORKS night. That game will be followed up with an exciting Saturday as Cologne will host both New Germany and the Spring Hill Chargers. Spring Hill will start the day off playing New Germany. Following that game, Spring Hill will be sticking around to play the Hollanders for the Good Luck game and to play for that travelling trophy. After losing to Spring Hill the past two years, the Hollanders will be looking to take that trophy home. So let's hope the weather cooperates in order to have a fun weekend. See everyone at the yard!

Ga Hollanders!