Road Warriors top Fairbanks

FAIRBANKS — The Alaska Road Warriors scored 13 unanswered runs to complete a two-game sweep of Fairbanks Sunday at Arco Field in Fairbanks.

“Everybody hit the ball well,” Road Warriors manager Steve Mossburgh said Monday.

Fairbanks jumped to an 8-1 lead off Alaska starter Colter Peterson, but the Road Warriors came alive in the fifth and sixth innings to storm past the Interior squad in the final game of the Midnight Sun Tournament.

Matt Packa picked up the win in relief of Peterson.

Mossburgh said Sunday’s game was unique in that he allowed his team captains — Wes Smith, Cory Cowgill, Chris Breck and Mike Dotson — to handle the coaching duties.

“They get tired of having me yell at them, so I figured I’d give them a chance to see what it’s like (to manage),” Mossburgh said.

Mossburgh said he was please with his captains’ leadership in the game.

“They did well and the team did well,” he said.

The Road Warriors were also supposed to play twice against Dimond over the weekend, but Mossbugh said the Lynx had their weekend cut short when a player was ejected in Saturday’s game with Fairbanks. American Legion rules stipulate that an ejected player must sit out a game, but the Lynx only brought nine players from Anchorage — meaning they didn’t have enough players to field a team for the rest of the three-day tournament.

The nonleague victory helped the Road Warriors improve to 7-3 overall on the season. The team has failed to score at least nine runs in just two of those games.

Alaska is currently 5-2 in the 11-team league, good enough for third place behind Chugiak (9-1) and South (6-1). South’s only loss this season was a 9-2 Road Warriors victory last week in Wasilla.  

The Road Warriors return to action Wednesday, when they’ll host Kenai’s Post 20 Twins for a doubleheader at Lou McManus Field. The league game will be played at 1:30 p.m., with a non-league game to follow.

Alaska is also gearing up for its annual Todd Ryan Tournament, which gets underway Thursday with a pair of games featuring East, Service and Napoleon, Ohio.

The Road Warriors will begin their tournament play Saturday at 4 p.m. against Service, with a match-up with East to follow. Alaska will host Napoleon at 5 p.m. Saturday in the final game of the round-robin tournament.

Contact Matt Tunseth at 352-2265  or matt.tunseth@frontiersman.com.