By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

EUGENE, Ore.–  It was a good start to the Summer for North Marion’s Carter Reilly.

Starting for the Lydo’s Lab 18U squad Tuesday night at Willamette High School in Eugene for a scheduled nine inning game, Reilly went seven innings against the American Legion Triple-A squad in the Post 20 Dirtbags.  The soon-to-be Huskie-grad threw a one-hitter and struck out six in the 10-0 victory in seven innings.

Not bad for being around a bunch of new teammates for two weeks to have a strong performance and starting the Summer with positive vibes and setting a standard for what is to come for them going forward.

“Carson told me before the game to be aggressive and that’s all you have to do, you can’t be passive when you’re up there.  Throw a lot of strikes,” Reilly said, who also had two hits and drove in a run in the game.  “They did barrel some balls today and guys made some great plays for me.  There’s nothing in particular that I did to shut them down, I was just throwing strikes and doing what I normally do.”

And with his freshman year at Feather River College, a junior college located in Quincy, California about two-and-a-half hours northeast of Sacramento, this Summer will be crucial for Reilly as FRC went 35-10 this past Spring and reached the CCCAA Super Regionals.

“That’s why I’m here.  Mark is my hitting coach, Carson is a really good pitching coach and I think they can really help me develop over the Summer to get me to the next level.  Playing with these guys, these guys are going to help me get to the next level just by the competitiveness that they bring,” Reilly said.  “It’s really important to be on this team because I know they can help me get to that next level.”

The lone hit Reilly surrendered came way of Dallas’ Jack Strange.  A lead-off single in the top half of the third inning as the Dirtbags suffered just their first defeat of the young season four games in.

But nonetheless, it’s a good learning experience for the squad going into their Area-3 League Series with the Post 58 Crushers on June 17 in Stayton.  A good experience in seeing that kind of pitching, executing on the mound and overall just keeping the positive vibes rolling.

“We just have to get used to that more often…just seeing this will help us improve in the future.  We’ll get used to it, we got to find more barrels,” Strange said.  “Positivity in the dugout, keeping the dugout up will help us a lot and throwing strikes.  We can’t walk seven guys and expect to win a baseball game.”

Santi Alacron struck out two pitching and Dalin McDonald struck out one pitching for Post 20.

Photos By Jeremy McDonald