Dodgers Show Resolve, Win Series Opener

WICHITA, Kan. —  Imagine a monotonous, 1,500-mile, midsummer meander through the deserts of the Great American Southwest. Imagine seven or eight baseball players crammed into every nook and cranny of a van that has no air conditioning.

Make that every aromatic nook and cranny. They pass the time by rolling up their sleeves and rolling down the windows. The ride lasts an eternity.

The group arrives in Kansas, and it’s 90-plus degrees outside with a humidity level to match. The team has roughly 36 hours to find a hotel, check out the playing facility, practice and recuperate in time for its first game.

No sweat, it’s only the World Series.

The Valley Dodgers, showing no sign of van-lag, claustrophobia or heat stroke, scored nine runs in the first three innings to advance to the second round of the National Baseball Congress World Series with a 10-4 win over the Miami Typhoons on Tuesday before 1,000 fans at Lawrence-Dumont Stadium.

The game was called after the seventh inning because of an NBC rule that states that a game shall be terminated when a team is behind by six runs after the seventh.

Any concerns Dodger Manager Jim Benedict might have had about his players’ energy level went, well, right out the window after the fast start.

“Most of the guys in my van were so ready to play that fatigue never seemed to be a problem,” said Benedict, who drove one of the team vans. “Heck, they were so psyched to play, so excited to see how we would do against this caliber of competition, that the drive didn’t seem to matter. We had a real loose group of guys.”

Miami must have been loose, too, considering the way it played defense. The Typhoons committed four errors, including three in the first inning that contributed to a four-run Dodger rally.

Lorenzo Lesky and Rene Rivera--who was 2 for 4 with 3 runs batted in--each singled home a run in the inning. Rob Scott, who was also 2 for 4, added the first of his three RBIs on a fielder’s choice. The fourth run scored on a wild pitch.

The Dodgers (30-6-1) padded their lead with five runs in the third. Two runs scored on a double by Scott, who played last season at Cal State Northridge. Rivera added a two-run single later in the inning.

Miami starter Bruce Charleboise, a right-hander, surrendered eight runs in 2 innings. Four Miami pitchers combined to walk eight Dodger batters and eight of nine Valley starters scored.

Fred Riscen (7-1), who was an All-Western State Conference selection last season at College of the Canyons, earned the victory by allowing 4 runs in 5 innings and striking out 3. Riscen, a left-hander, will attend Texas A&M; in the fall.

Right-hander Tim Quintanilla pitched the final 1 innings, recording three strikeouts.

Benedict’s team should find out how it will fare against stiff competition when the Dodgers take on the top-ranked Grand Rapids Sullivans on Thursday.

The Sullivans finished second in the World Series last year and played in the championship game three of the past four years.

Right-hander Rene Isenhart (3-0) is the projected starter for the Dodgers, who have won 15 of 16 games since Benedict took over as manager at mid-season. Benedict served as pitching coach at Valley College last season but recently accepted a position at Loyola Marymount.