Montreal vs. Carolina

The rest of the series....

Game 3
Montreal doesn't give up a single walk, their Achilles' so far this series. Still, Carolina manages 8 hits and scores 3 runs over nine innings.

It would not be enough as Todd Blanchard would last just 2.1 innings, allowing 6 ER. Blanchard's fly ball tendencies didn't match up well against Montreal. Four of his six hits given up were extra base hits (2 HR and 2 2B). Tom Becker added his third hit in the 2nd, a three-run HR.

Carolina's bullpen would throw shut out ball the rest of the way, but the margin was too great to make up.

Montreal takes the series lead 2-1.

Game 4
SP Dimitri Serban's 8 IP and 2 ER performance would allow Carolina to tie the series with a late comeback and an extra inning walk-off.

Carolina has 11 hits, but only 2 were for extra bases. No runs at all were scored until the top of the 8th, when Montreal put two on the board. Carolina would answer in the 9th on Scott Andrew's double, sending the game into extra innings.

Even though Montreal kept their walk numbers down again, Bo Hall's leadoff walk in the 11th turned into the winning run when Martin Bryan tripled for the walk-off.

Series tied at 2.

Game 5
It looked again like walks might come to haunt Montreal late in Game 5.

Raúl Pérez went into the 9th with a 2-0 lead. He had given up just 2 hits all game and there were two outs when he allowed his first walk of the game, Scott Andrews. Allen Marshall came on in relief and walked his first batter, bringing the winning run and small window of hope to the plate, Greg Beard. Beard took one pitch and then flew out to right.

Montreal's first of two runs came on a Bob Reece single in the 5th, scoring Stanislav Izyurov. Their second score came in the 8th when Izyurov drew a bases loaded walk that forced Wilton Collins home.

Andrews was the only Carolina player to reach second base the entire game.

Montreal goes back up 3-2.

Game 6

Blanchard was back on the mound this game and the result was the same as Game 3, except that Blanchard lasted into the fifth. The rest of his line was amazingly similar, 6 ER, 6 hits (4 extra base hits: 2 HR, 2 2B).   

This gave Blanchard 12 earned runs for the series. In case you're wondering, that's half of the runs given up by the Crush in the series.

Carolina battled, the bullpen coming in to shut things down again. The Crush did manage 11 hits, but this time, just one was an extra base hit. The Bandits kept their free passes down for the fourth game in a row, allowing just two for the game.

While the Crush managed to get baserunners and score four runs over the course of the game, their lack of power didn't allow them to get back into this one after the damage had been done. Their biggest "miss" this game was managing to work the bases loaded in the first with two outs but coming up empty.

Montreal would advance, continuing their seemingly inevitable march for a 2nd championship.