Laramie Rangers Keep Piling up the Wins

The Laramie Rangers extended their win streak to eight straight with four more victories last weekend on the baseball diamond.

Laramie (29-11) has already surpassed last season’s win total by two, and there is still a month remaining in the season.

Manager Aaron Lozano said I think it’s a compliment that people say we’re finding ways to win games.

“I think it speaks to the heart of the team. It speaks to the fact that we can beat you in multiple ways. We can win 1-nothing games. We can win 2-1 games. We can also slug with you. We can also play small ball. I think that’s the hard part about playing against the Rangers right now is we can kind of do whatever we want, it seems like at times, and whatever kind of game we get into, we’re in a place where we can win a ballgame.”

The Rangers swept a doubleheader in Scottsbluff, NE last Friday against the Westco Zephyrs, 4-1 and 10-4 in eight innings. In the first game, Laramie’s Ryan Chamberlain held the Zephyrs to one run on five hits. He struck out eight and walked only two. Riley Hogsett had two hits and an RBI against Westco. In the second game, the Rangers let an early 4-0 lead slip away, but a 6-run eighth inning led to a sweep. Laramie took advantage of three errors by the Zephyrs, three singles, two walks, and a hit batter. Aidan Morris had two hits and 3 RBI’s.

Last Saturday, the Rangers won at Torrington, 10-2. Morris and Chamberlain had four hits apiece as part of a 15-hit attack. Laramie scored in all but one inning and overcame six errors defensively. Brandon Chavez and Mason Branch added two hits and two RBI’s apiece.

On Sunday, the Rangers were back home at Cowboy Field. They slogged through a rainstorm and rallied with three runs in the bottom of the seventh inning for an 8-7 victory over Gering, NE. Laramie trailed 5-0 in the first inning. It was 6-0 Gering in the fourth when Laramie finally scored on a sacrifice bunt by Diego Medina. The Rangers added two in the fifth on a dropped fly ball and two in the sixth on an RBI single by Medina and a wild pitch. Gering scored one in the seventh for a 7-5 lead.

In their last at-bat, Laramie opened with two walks to Morris and Garrett Dodd. A sacrifice bunt was put down by Chavez, but it was thrown away which led to Morris and Dodd scoring to tie the game. Chavez advanced to third on the error. After a strikeout, Chavez scored on a wild pitch for the walk-off victory, 8-7. Tayton Moore got the win in relief with four innings pitched. Chamberlain and Billy Jenkin had two hits apiece.

Lozano added after the win, “It’s another testament to how hard it is to keep the Laramie Rangers down. Hats off to Gering, you know, they had to play through the same stuff (constant rain and muddy field conditions). Unfortunately, we had to slog through; never got a call from the umpires there on delaying or anything like that. It is what it is, and the Rangers come through with a win.”

Next up is a conference doubleheader at home against Gillette on Wednesday, June 30, at 1 p.m. from Cowboy Field.

Laramie is 3-3 in conference games, while the Roughriders (37-21) are 1-3.

Lozano said, “The one thing that I would say is you can never really count out Gillette. They’ve had some struggles in conference (so far) and different struggles throughout the season with a young ball club, but (manager) Nate Perleberg’s not a rookie. He’s a really good baseball coach, and he’s got some talented ballplayers that are, maybe, getting some bad stuff out of the way early to learn from it and be good later on.”

Lozano went on to say it’s time for his team to take that next step.

The Roughriders play at Cheyenne on Tuesday before coming to Laramie on Wednesday.

KOWB will carry both conference games live on the radio (AM 1290), KOWB app, and online with coverage starting at 12:45 p.m.