By JOHN BOHNENKAMP
Aiden McGee had to think about what was his longest baseball road trip so far in college.
“Went up to Crookston, Minnesota,” said McGee, a pitcher for the Burlington Bees who plays his college baseball at Minnesota State University in Mankato. “That’s about seven or eight hours from Mankato. That was quite the trip — we actually played a tripleheader that day because the weather wasn’t cooperating.”
The Bees are about to head out on quite the road trip. After Monday’s 7-3 win over the Normal CornBelters in a Prospect League game at Community Field, the Bees leave town on Tuesday to begin a seven-games-in-six-days trip that will take them to four states and on a bus for more than 1,500 miles.
The Bees play Tuesday night at Lafayette (Indiana), Wednesday against the Champion City Kings (Springfield, Ohio), Thursday and Friday against the Johnston (Pennsylvania) Mill Rats, back to play Champion City on Saturday, and then a doubleheader against the Cornbelters in Normal, Ill., on Sunday.
Burlington will take plenty of momentum on the road. The Bees (14-18 overall, 4-1 second half), on a four-game winning streak, lead the Great River Division by a half-game over first-half champion Clinton.
“I feel like everything right now with this team is, ‘Let’s go, full go,’ Bees manager Owen Oreskovich said. “The momentum helps, obviously. Right now I feel like we’re in a pretty good place. Hopefully we can stay this way.”
McGee (2-2), a reliever all season for Minnesota State, has been working as a starter for the Bees. He threw five innings in this game, his second longest start of the season — he threw six innings in a 4-1 win at Jackson on June 17. McGee allowed just four hits and four walks to go with four strikeouts.
“I’ve only had one other start of five or six innings, so I’m glad I was able to get it going, put some zeroes up,” McGee said.
It’s been an education with his new role, McGee said.
“Just using my off-speed earlier, and then my fastball will stay through five or six innings,” he said. “That’s probably been the toughest part is locating the off-speed for strikes early on, because if I throw a fastball every time I’ll be gassed by the second (inning).”
The Bees gave McGee a 2-0 lead in the first inning on Mason Schwalbach’s RBI single and Caleb Wulf’s sacrifice fly, but Normal (18-16, 3-4) came back with two runs in the second inning.
“Early on, the fastball was working,” McGee said. “Second inning, a couple of them got away from me, so I went to the cutter and I was using that to get ahead. Started to get some soft contact, some fly balls, defense was working for me, and the bats kept going. Everything came together.”
The Bees’ offense picked up McGee with a run in the second on Jaden Hackbarth’s single, and then added three runs in the third.
“I know they’ve got my back,” McGee said of the offense. “I was a little upset giving up two after we scored two. It was right back to a tie game.”
McGee settled in after the second inning, allowing just a third-inning single and two walks in the fifth.
“McGee worked out of some stuff there early, really dug deep, worked through it, and did a hell of a job there,” Oreskovich said. “His first couple of innings, he was getting 3-2 counts on seemingly everybody. We kept telling him, ‘Hey, you’ve got to get ahead early.’ Make them put the ball play and get themselves out.”
Nick Tampa, Drew Martin and Jake Jakubowski finished the game for the Bees, allowing just one run and two hits over the final four innings.
The Bees had 10 hits, including three from Hackbarth, who drove in three runs, and two from Tanner Holland and Keanu Spenser.
Now it’s time to hit the road.
“It’s going to be a lot, a lot of baseball in six days,” McGee said. “So we’re going to need everyone, and I think we’ve got everybody in the right mindset to do that.”
“Bus leaves at 10 a.m.,” Oreskovich said, smiling.
NOTES: Corey Boyette has started his time with the Bees with a six-game hitting streak, batting .333 in the stretch. … Schwalbach has a five-game hitting streak (.381). … Spenser has a five-game hitting streak (.400). … Hackbarth is hitting .600 over the last three games.
Photo: Bees third baseman Brandon Bickford scores one of his two runs in Monday’s game. (Steve Cirinna/Burlington Bees)
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