Gold Sox cruise past Walnut Creek

The Marysville Gold Sox just needed one big inning on Saturday night.

The Sox rivaled the postgame fireworks show with an explosive effort in the bottom of the third inning and cruised past the Walnut Creek Crawdads 7-2 in front of 2,150 fans at Appeal-Democrat Park.

Marysville (25-9) scored five runs in the third to jump ahead 5-0.

Johnny Rubino knocked in Tito Quiñones on a double and Rubino scored on Kyle Davis' single.

Justin Lamb picked up two RBIs on a double and Casey Scott's sacrifice fly made things 5-0.

After Walnut Creek scored two runs in the top of the eighth, Marysville answered right back on Victor Romero's two-run shot over the right-field wall.

It was Romero's eighth home run of the season, extending his Gold Sox single season record. He has back-to-back homers after Friday's three-run bomb. The home run also extended the club's single-season record to 25. The previous record was held by last year's team, which recorded 23.

All that run support was more than enough for right-hander Nick Hudson, who went seven innings for the Gold Sox with eight strikeouts and only four hits allowed.

Hudson improved to 5-1 with the victory.

Marysville defeated Walnut Creek 7-6 in extra innings on Friday night and will look for the sweep today at 6 p.m. in the final game of the series.