VALLEY CITY, N.D. (NewsDakota.com) – Valley City welcomed Mayville to town on Monday on a day that started out hot and humid. However, the forecast wouldn’t stay like that all game as a thunderstorm passed through Valley City and would cut the game short after just 5 1/3 innings, giving Mayville the 4-0 win.

Technically in this game Valley City was the designated road team. They would lead the game off with an infield single from Ethan Miller and then a walk to Braxton Jorissen, but the next three Royal batters would be put out. In the bottom of the first inning Mayville would strike for a pair of runs. Reed Kritzberger, with a runner on third would provide and RBI double to give the Patriots the 1-0 lead. Kritzberger would come around to score a couple of batters later after a sacrifice fly out from Landon Koenig. Mayville would add another run in the home half of the 2nd inning. Andrew Aarsvold would get hit by a pitch and would come around to score thanks to a fielding error by Valley City. For good measure, Mayville would add to their lead in the bottom of the 5th when Ethan Bergstrom would come in to score from and RBI single from Lucas Fugleberg to extend the Patriots lead to 4-0, the score that they would go on to win by.

It was a tough night for Valley City at the plate. They would strand a pair of base runners in three separate innings in the loss, and only have 4 hits in the entire game. Much of that was due to starting Patriots pitcher Lucas Fugleberg. The right hander would pitch the full game for Mayville (6-innings) allowing 4 hits, 0 runs while striking out 4. A tip of the cap goes out to the starter for Valley City, Espen Kunze. The submarine pitcher got the start and went 4 2/3 on the mound giving up just 2 hits and striking out 1.

The game was called in the bottom of the 6th inning with 1 out and Mayville at the plate due to a thunderstorm passing through the area and a rain delay that was over an hour and a half.