Big crowd watches Young Jr. play big

Eric Young Jr. continued his torrid hitting Friday against Salt Lake as he led the Sky Sox to an 8-2 win in front of 8,768 at Security Service Field.

By going 2-for-4, Young extended his streak of consecutive games with multiple hits to five. In that stretch, the second baseman has gone 10-for-22.

"I'm just simplifying things," said Young, who leads the Pacific Coast League in stolen bases (46) and runs (70). "When you're cold, sometimes you overthink. Baseball players go on hot and cold streaks all the time - it just so happens I'm doing good right now."

Young also provided the finishing blow to Salt Lake starter Shane Loux in the fourth inning. With the bases loaded, he laced a single up the middle, scoring two and ending Loux's night after five runs allowed.

Sky Sox starter Greg Smith went 41/3 innings, scattering six hits and giving up only two runs.

But that's all Salt Lake (42-40) would get. The Colorado Springs bullpen pitched 42/3 scoreless innings.

"It's nice to know that you can count on your bullpen to come in and close things down," manager Stu Cole said. "These guys have been working hard all year and everything's just falling into place right now."

The Sky Sox did most of their offensive work in the third and fourth innings. Colorado Springs (48-33) had a bases-loaded, nobody-out situation and scored two runs in each inning.

For the three-game series, Colorado Springs drew 21,951 fans, the most in the franchise's 22-year history for that many games.

The Sky Sox will hit the road today for a four-game series at Portland. Colorado Springs will send Alan Johnson (7-3, 5.87 ERA) to the mound to face Matt Buschmann (3-8, 6.27 ERA). The Sky Sox are 6-2 against Portland this year.