The Stanislaus Cardinals Babe Ruth summer baseball team met their local rivals, the Stanislaus Royals, on Thursday night in a home contest at Turlock High.

After going down early in the game, the Cardinals produced nine runs in the third inning to hurl the local team over the Royals, pulling off a big 16-7 victory.

“It’s good to have our backs against the wall early,” said Cardinals head coach Bobby Swedberg. “We got guys coming from senior trips or vacation and so forth, so our defense still isn’t there as you saw. There were some errors made early.”

The miscues were only in the beginning of the game, as the Cardinals began to ease their way into the game as it got deeper.

The Royals had no issue going up in the second inning as they tacked on the first runs of the ball game when AG Reed smacked a two-run double to take a 2-0 lead.

Then by the second inning, the Cardinals had scored three and cut the lead to 3-4.

“We found ourselves down four at one point, but what I saw the second time around in the lineup was more discipline at the plate,” said Swedberg.

Discipline is an understatement.

The Cardinals were down heading into the bottom half of the third inning and then with two outs, the rally began.

Alex Pallios of Turlock High began the rally with an RBI fielder’s choice. Before the inning had ended, the Cardinals had gone through the entire lineup and gone up 12-6.

“Really laid off the curveball and that really got us going and once we got bases loaded then we were able to capitalize,” Swedberg said. “Good to see the kids battle and not hang their heads early.”

They never looked back as Swedberg subbed in Pitman junior-to-be, Bradley Enos, and the tall right-handed pitcher tossed a three-up and three-down inning in the fourth.

Marcus Lopez and Cody Cornell of Turlock ended the day for the Cardinals and the local team held on to the win for their third win of the season. They are now 3-0-1 heading into tonight’s doubleheader against Hollister.

Alex Chavez of Hilmar was 3-for-4, Michael Cummins was 2-for-2 and 11 different Cardinal batters got at least one hit for the game out of 15 hits total.

“Everybody is still getting a feel for each other since it is early in the summer,” Swedberg said. “But our pitching is deep since we have multiple guys out there throwing and our guys are starting to learn each pitcher and the defense is also playing well behind them and it helps.”

The doubleheader in Hollister begins at 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. tonight followed by a doubleheader at home on Sunday.