Garcia's grand slam leads Knights in rout of Falcons.

Roman Garcia's grand slam capped a five-run sixth inning that powered Corvallis to a 12-0 victory over Kelowna on Tuesday night before a crowd of 899 in its WCL home opener.

A rising senior at San Diego, Garcia's homer easily cleared the left-field fence just inside the foul pole. It gave the Knights (6-5 all, 5-5 WCL) a 7-0 advantage and they cruised home from there.

"The guy before me got a single to get the momentum going for my at-bat," Garcia said. "Fastball first pitch, and I just swung it."

The RBIs were Garcia's first of the summer after 39 at-bats. A .313 hitter at USD in 2016 who was having trouble finding his groove with the Knights, Garcia is 5-for-8 (.625) in his last two games and has raised his average 99 points to .220.

"I am definitely seeing the ball better and getting more comfortable," he said. "I want to get some quality at bats and work on my approach, do the right things in situations, whether it's moving the guy over, getting a sac fly; just not being selfish."

Catcher Adley Rutschman (Sherwood HS/Oregon State in 2016-17) added a double, two singles, two runs and an RBI. Third baseman Cole Kreuter (UC Irvine) singled twice and drove in two in his 2016 debut and Andy Atwood (OSU) and Taylor Travess (Mt. Hood) each had two singles and two runs.

Atwood also drive in a run. He has at least one hit in all four games he has played in since joining the team on June 10 and is batting .400 (6-15) with a homer and four RBIs.

The Knights established season-highs in runs (12) and hits (15) in the series opener against the Falcons (5-4 WCL), last year's WCL runners-up.

Starter Ryley Widell continued his strong early-season work with five shutout innings. He struck out six and allowed only three hits while improving his record to 2-0 and dropping his ERA to 1.74.

Relievers Chris Burkholder (Dartmouth) and Branden Cutsforth (Treasure Valley CC) finished up with two innings apiece. It was Burkholder's first appearance of the season.

The series resumes at 6:40 p.m. Wednesday. San Francisco righty Grant Goodman (0-0, 0.00) is the projected starter for Corvallis, opposed by Edmonds (Wash.) CC righty Blake Rendazzo (0-0, 2.57).

Wednesday is a KDUK Working Women�s Wednesday/Holiday Inn Express Magnet Schedule Night/Jamba Juice Reading Club game. The first 1,000 fans receive free 2016 magnet schedules.

Tuesday's crowd of 899 raised the yearly attendance to 4,380 for two dates. That is 591 fans ahead of last year's record total of 49,656 through a corresponding number of openings.