Trentacosta ties Starr's save mark, Knights stay alive with 7-5 victory.

Closer Mark Trentacosta (pictured) tied the franchise record with his 10th save and the Knights forced Game 3 in the WCL West Divisional Series with a 7-5 win over Bend.

The rubber game is scheduled for 6:40 p.m. Sunday at Goss Stadium. The pitching matchup features two right-handers, Chase Johnson (3-1, 2.03) of Cal Poly for the Knights and Jason Wilson (3-5, 3.30) of Western Oregon for the Elks.

Wilson replaces Stephen Ostapeck (5-3, 1.81) of Villanova, who left the Elks on Saturday to return to school.

The victor advances to the WCL Championship Series against Walla Walla. The No. 2-seeded Sweets shocked host and top-seeded Wenatchee 5-4 on Saturday to sweep the East Division playoff.

The best-of-3 finals will start in Walla Walla on Tuesday night and will resume in Corvallis or Bend on Thursday night after a travel day. Game 3 would be Friday night, if necessary.

Trentacosta pitched a scoreless ninth and had two strikeouts while matching the record set by Taylor Starr in 2008, the year the Knights won their lone WCL championship. Bend had the tying runs on base with one out after an error and an infield single, but he fanned cleanup hitter Nick Wagner on an eight-pitch at-bat and then got Jordan Browser on a routine fly ball to center to end the game.

Left fielder Kramer Scott, who had the Knights' lone RBI in a 3-1 loss in Bend in Friday night's series opener, had a double, two singles and two RBIs to lead a 10-hit attack. Catcher Ryan Gorton had two hits, two runs and two RBIs; DH Corey Davis had two hits and an RBI and David Armendariz tripled and singled.

Gorton and Davis had RBIs in the fourth, when the Knights took a 2-0 lead. Scott had two RBIs, Gorton and Cade Gotta one each in a 5-run sixth that gave the Knights a 7-0 lead.

"I've been swinging well but (the ball) has been going right at people" when he's made solid contact, Gorton said. "I didn't change my approach, I just kept putting good swings on the ball and knew it would find a hole."

He said the Knights were confident even though Friday's loss at Bend had them on the brink of elimination.

"We didn�t want to stop playing," he said. "We have a great team and want to play as long as we can. We were pumped to get the win."

A 7-0 lead seemed very safe, seeing as how starter Chris Johnson had extended his scoreless streak to 27 straight innings by blanking the Elks on two hits through six frames and was cruising heading into the seventh.

However, Johnson hit the leadoff batter and the next five Elks hit singles to slice the lead to 7-4. Ben Wetzler relieved and allowed a sacrifice fly, but avoided further damage and pitched a scoreless eighth to position Trentacosta for the save.

Johnson (6-0) struck out five and hit two batters. He had not allowed a run since the first inning of a July 8 start at Kelowna; he is 4-0 over the five games encompassing the streak.

The crowd of 642 raised the Knights' season attendance to a franchise-record 40,204 in 31 dates, with at least one, and possibly three, games remaining. The old record was 31,536 in 33 dates in 2009.