JOLIET, Ill. – Left-hander Anthony Boughner (pictured) was stellar yet again for Kansas City, throwing seven shutout innings to propel the T-Bones to a 7-1 victory over the Joliet JackHammers at Silver Cross Field in Joliet, Ill.  The win extends Kansas City’s division lead to five games over second place Gary and five and-a-half games over Joliet and Schaumburg with 12 games left in the season.

Both teams went down in order in the first inning before Kansas City jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the second on a wild pitch by Joliet starter Matt Smith and a sacrifice fly from right fielder Nick Jaros.

The T-Bones didn’t score again until the fifth inning when Geoff McCallum doubled in Jaros, who led off the frame with a double of his own.  A solo home run by Al Benjamin to lead off the sixth gave Kansas City a 4-0 lead, and chased Smith from the game as the right-hander went on to suffer the loss, allowing four runs on six hits in five-plus innings of work.

The story was Boughner though as he went three and one-thirds perfect innings before surrendering a single to Tim Hutting in the fourth.  The JackHammers would get one single in each of the next three innings, but only got one runner to second base against Boughner who improved to 7-3, allowing just four hits while striking out three and walking none in the contest.

Kansas City scored three runs, one earned, in the eighth inning, the first coming on a solo home run from Patrick Arlis off reliever Derrick Ellison.  A two-out error by Hutting allowed Aharon Eggleston to reach while scoring Jaros from second.  The next hitter, McCallum, drove in Eggleston with a single, capping off the scoring for Kansas City.

Raymond Jenkins threw the final two innings for the T-Bones, allowing Joliet’s only run on a solo home run by former T-Bone Chad Ehrnsberger in the ninth.

The two teams face off again tomorrow in a battle of lefties with Rick DeHart going for Kansas City versus Joliet’s Brian Forystek.  First pitch is scheduled for 6:05.

Game Notes:  Kansas City’s magic number is now at nine with 12 games to play in the season…Rob Watson failed to reach base safely, going 0-for-five to snap his on-base streak at 31 games…Calvin Pickering went 0-for-four but walked and scored in the second to extend his on-base streak to 33 games, the longest current streak in the league…Joliet reliever Jason Cierlik pitched two innings for the JackHammers, getting all six outs in strikeout form, including four-in-a-row…Boughner is now 5-0 with a 3.08 ERA since the All-Star break.