Knights revive Albany Rollers but fall to Pippins in 11

Wednesday, July 10, Albany, Ore. – Corvallis turned back the clock to honor a team from the region’s past with a special Albany Night game at Dick McClain Field at Linn-Benton Community College.

The Knights assumed the identity of the Albany Log Rollers, a Class D professional team from the Pacific Coast International League that played the final two months of the 1904 season at the Albany Base Ball Park after the Vancouver, Wash. Soldiers were shifted there at midseason due to territorial rights issues.

The PCIL folded before the 1905 season and the Log Rollers disappeared along with the league. But they were briefly reborn when the Knights wore special blue-and-white Log Roller uniforms and white caps with blue brims to commemorate their predecessors in a 5-4, 11-inning loss to the Yakima Valley Pippins before a sun-drenched crowd of 345.

Yakima Valley parlayed a single and three straight two-out walks to score the go-ahead run in the top of the 11^th. They then threw out the potential tying run at home and caught a fly ball on the warning track for the final out, snapping Corvallis’s eight-game winning streak.

Second baseman Ty Yukumoto (Pacific, pictured above) tripled, doubled, stole home and scored three times to pace the Knights (27-6 overall, 23-6 WCL, 1-1 second half). Blake Wilson (Washington) was 2-for-5 with an RBI and Kellen Segel (LBCC) went 2-for-5 with a steal on his home field.

Yukumoto’s straight steal of home enabled the Knights to tie the score in the home first. They went ahead 2-1 in the fifth on an RBI groundout by Kevin Takeuchi (USC), but the Pippins scored three times in the seventh to surge ahead 4-2.

Yukumoto tripled and scored on a throwing error in the seventh to slice the deficit to 4-3. Corvallis was down to its final strike in the last of the ninth but Wilson singled home Kasen Khansarinia (UCLA) with the tying run.

Yukumoto earned Washington Park Advisors Player of the Game honors.

The Knights are 2-1 in extra-inning games this summer. They are now 1-1 all-time in home games not played at Goss Stadium. They defeated Kitsap 6-2 on July 29, 2007 in a contest played at Taylor Field.

The series concludes on July 11 with a 4 p.m. doubleheader at Goss Stadium; both games will be seven innings. The projected starters are Payton Riske (1-1, 2,73) of Utah and James DeCremer (0-0, 3.11) of Oregon State for the Knights, opposed by Ethan Salscheider (3-2, 3.81) of Hawaii-Hilo and Tyler Disch (0-0, 7.24) of Yakima Community College.

Corvallis has clinched the first-half South Division championship and will advance to the West Coast League playoffs for the 17^th consecutive season. The postseason starts on Aug. 10.

In other team-related news, right-handed pitcher Nathan Marshall has committed to Eastern Illinois for his final two collegiate seasons. The West Albany High School grad spent the past two seasons at Lane Community College in Eugene.

Marshall is being shut down for the balance of the summer and finished his second full season with the Knights at 0-0, 1.35 in six appearances, with six strikeouts in 6.2 innings. He was 2-2, 2.01 in 13 games in 2023, with 20 strikeouts in 35.2 innings. He pitched in one game in 2022 and went 0-0, 3.60 in five innings, with three strikeouts.

Marshall was 9-1, 2.05 in 14 games at Lane this past spring, with 52 strikeouts in 74.2 innings. He earned South Region all-star honors. EIU is located in Charleston, Ill. The Panthers play in the Ohio Valley Conference.

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