Lake Erie slugs its way past Down East to move closer to division title

AVON — Lake Erie gave itself some breathing room for the home stretch. The Crushers took care of business with a pair of three-run innings during an 8-2 win over the Down East Bird Dawgs. The game was called after the top of the eighth because of inclement weather. Thursday may have been the last home game of the regular season, but more baseball is on the horizon for Lake Erie (52-39), which has qualified for the Frontier League playoffs as at least a wild card. The win lowered Lake Erie's a magic number to clinch the Central Division to two, as it holds a one-game lead on Washington with three to play. The Crushers will, at minimum, need to win two of their final three games in Joliet, beginning today, to wrap up the division. Every Wild Things loss makes Lake Erie's job easier. "We're treating this as a playoff series," Lake Erie manager Jared Lemieux said. "We have control of our destiny. If we go win the next series, we become division champions. So we're treating this as a playoff series coming up against Joliet. We're trying to come home with that division championship." Lake Erie had a scare in the first inning when starter Jack Eisenbarger took a line drive off his left side and went down for a few minutes as trainers came out to evaluate him. After a few warmup pitches, he was earned his 10th win, allowing an unearned run on three hits and two walks with five strikeouts. Lemieux said Eisenbarger will start Game 1 of the wild card series Wednesday. If the Crushers win the division, they will likely travel to Gateway for Game 1 and host Games 2-3 on Sept. 5-6. Eisenbarger hails from Kirkwood, Missouri, which is less than 30 minutes from the Grizzlies' home field. "Sometimes it happens, just have to settle in," Eisenbarger said. "I felt I was throwing it well. I just locked in and kept it going. I'm feeling good going into the postseason. It's exciting. The team is ready to go get after it." Sam Franco gave Lake Erie its first lead with a two-out shot to the left-field wall, scoring Alfredo Gonzalez. The Crushers added to the lead in the fourth, again with two outs. Gonzalez crushed a three-run home run over the left-field wall to make the lead 5-1. He finished with four RBIs. Jarrod Watkins, Burle Dixon and Dario Gomez each drove in a run to make it 8-1 in the fifth. Gomez finished the night 5-for-5 with a double and triple, scoring twice. "Alfredo had a big swing for us today to give us some comfort," Lemieux said. "That's what you need out of your veteran ex-big leaguer. I'm excited to see the whole group turning along. Dario had a big day with five hits. That's what we need to be. We need to be a lineup that's tough one through nine and never make it easy on the opposing pitcher. That's what we did tonight." Contact Chris Sweeney at 329-7135 or ctsports@chroniclet.com. Follow him @CSweeney1686 on X.