Hot Rods second baseman Miles Mastrobuoni fields a ground ball during their game against Fort Wayne on Friday, April 7, 2017, at Bowling Green Ballpark. (Austin Anthony/photo@bgdailynews.com)

The Bowling Green Hot Rods picked up the first victory of the season, outlasting Fort Wayne (Ind.) 6-4 in a nine-inning marathon Friday at Bowling Green Ballpark.

Bowling Green (1-1) rallied twice early to earn the split in the two-game series, winning a game that took 3 hours and 25 minutes.

Trailing 1-0 in the third, Nate Lowe delivered a two-out, two-run single to give the Hot Rods a 2-1 advantage.

Fort Wayne came back with a two-run homer from Brad Zunica in the top of the fourth, but BG answered with RBI singles from Jesus Sanchez and Miles Mastrobuoni to make the score 4-3 in the bottom of the inning.

Garrett Whitley added a solo homer to start the sixth and the Hot Rods pushed the margin to 6-3 when Sanchez scored on a wild pitch.

The TinCaps got a run back on RBI triple from G.K. Young in the eighth, but couldn’t get any closer.

Roel Ramirez earned the win for the Hot Rods, allowing two runs in three innings of relief.

Emmanuel Ramirez took the loss for Fort Wayne, allowing four runs and six hits in two innings.

Lowe and Sanchez paced the BG offense with two hits each.

Free passes

A night after the pitching staffs combined for 35 strikeouts the staffs combined to allow 12 walks and two hit batters. Fort Wayne walked five batters, while Bowling Green walked seven batters. Five of the walks came around to score.

The pitching staffs did combine to strike out 26 batters, 14 by Hot Rods pitchers.

Up next

The two teams will head to Fort Wayne for the first of two at 5:05 p.m. CDT Saturday.

Peter Bayer is scheduled to start for the Hot Rods. Bayer went 2-1 with a 0.83 ERA in 10 appearances, seven starts, for Princeton (W.Va.) in the Appalachian League last season.

Austin Smith, who went 4-6 with a 5.25 ERA with Fort Wayne last season, is scheduled to start for the TinCaps. Smith made four starts against Bowling Green last season, going 0-1. He allowed 13 runs in 12 2/3 innings.{&end}