The Winston-Salem Dash and the Potomac Nationals will open a five-game series for the Carolina League championship at BB&T Ballpark tonight at 7 o'clock.
The Dash advanced with a three-game sweep of the Kinston Indians, while the Nationals won their series with the Frederick Keys in four games.
Game 2 will also be at BB&T Ballpark on Tuesday night, with Game 3 scheduled for Potomac on Thursday night. Games 4 and 5, if necessary, would also be played at Potomac.
Stephen Sauer will start for the Dash tonight, and Danny Rosenbaum for the Nationals. Dylan Axelrod will start for the Dash in Game 2, and Trevor Holder for the Nationals. Potomac was the first team to play against Winston-Salem at BB&T Ballpark on April 13. The Nationals won that game 5-4 in 12 innings. Sauer started for the Dash but did not figure in the decision.
The Dash beat Kinston 3-2 and 2-0 in the first two games of the semifinal series at BB&T Ballpark and held a 4-1 lead going into the bottom of the eighth inning in Game 3 at Kinston's Grainger Stadium. The Indians scored four runs in the eighth to take a 5-4 lead, with Jeremie Tice's two-run single the key base hit. Jon Gilmore's two-out single drove in Greg Paiml in the top of the ninth to tie the score.
"They're resilient, they just don't stop," Manager Joe Mc-Ewing of the Dash told minor-league baseball's official website. "At that point it's easy to shut down. And they didn't do it (Friday night) and haven't done it all year. One through 25, they grind every at-bat, every pitch, every defensive play until the last out."
The Dash finally broke the game open in the top of the 12th inning with a five-run outburst that ended with a 10-5 victory. The key hit was a three-run homer by Jose Martinez off reliever Matthew Langwell to give the Dash an 8-5 lead.
"He got a slider in and put a pretty great swing on it," McEwing told milb.com. "It looked like it was going to go foul, but it stayed fair the whole way. That was a big home run."
The Nationals lost their first game to the Keys 10-9, but won the next three by scores of 5-4, 7-1 and 10-3.
Bill Rhinehart led the Nats with a .294 batting average, two home runs and seven RBIs in the series against the Keys.
The Dash had a 12-8 record against the Nationals during the regular season, but Rhinehart told milb.com he was optimistic about his team's chances.
"We know the series against Winston-Salem is going to be tough," he said. "They are going to be ready for us. We're just going to take it one game at a time. We know they have a great offense; every time we play them they have double-digit hits, and their pitching is pretty good as well. It doesn't matter who we play. As long as we go out there as a team, we should be fine."
Seth Loman was the top offensive performer for the Dash against the Nationals this season. He hit .308 with four home runs and 15 RBIs. Winston-Salem had a 5.16 ERA against Potomac in the season series. The Nationals hit .276 against the Dash and had an ERA of 5.31.
This is the first time Winston-Salem has made it to the league's championship series since 2003, when the Winston-Salem Warthogs won the title. Potomac won the championship in 2008.
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