By Marny Hendrick

sports@salisburypost.com

KANNAPOLIS — The Kannapolis Intimidators suddenly have a number of positive streaks working in their favor. The most important is a three-game winning streak.

Righthander Thad Lowry overcame a shaky start, then combined with closer Matt Cooper to shut down the Greensboro Grasshoppers, 4-2, Sunday afternoon at Intimidators Stadium. The win gave Kannapolis a 55-50 overall record (20-16 in the second half), as they took the home series by winning three out of four games.

Lowry, a 2013 fourth-round pick out of Spring, Texas, surrendered four singles in the top of the first inning to quickly fall behind, 2-0. But Lowry righted the ship with his own pitching adjustments.

“I realized in the first inning that they (Greensboro hitters) were lunging on the sliders and having success.” he said. “So I went to the two-seamer (fastball) after that and it worked out well.”

The Grasshoppers notched seven of their nine hits in the first two innings but were baffled by Lowry (11-5) and Cooper (11 saves) the rest of the way. A pair of timely double plays in those first two frames, including one initiated by Lowry himself, kept Greensboro (39-66, 10-26) from capitalizing further on the flurry of hits.

“Oh yeah, those double plays really helped out a lot,” Lowry said. “I really liked the one turned by Toby Thomas (second baseman), then I made one and those were pretty much momentum killers.”

RBI-singles by K.J. Woods and Brian Schales put Greensboro up, 2-0, but Thomas and shortstop Ryan Leonards combined for the twin-killing to end the threat. Lowry took a combacker in the top of the second and started another double play with a throw to Leonards at second.

The Intimidators then knotted the score at 2-2 in the bottom of the second inning, when Leonards and Cody Daily singled off Grasshopper starter Michael Mader, putting runners on the corners.  After a walk to John Ziznewski loaded the bases with two outs, Thomas came through with a first-pitch double to the left field corner to score two runs.

Thomas also kept Greensboro from taking the lead in the bottom of the fourth frame when he threw out Schales trying to score from third on a sharp grounder. It was one of eight putouts by Thomas in the game.

Kannapolis took the lead for good in the bottom of  fourth inning as Alexander Simon led off with a double, moved to third on a ground out, then scored on Ziznewski’s sacrifice fly for the 3-2 lead. Ziznewski’s seventh-inning double led to an insurance run when Michael Suiter singled past a drawn in infield to make it 4-2. The hit extened Suiter’s hitting streak to 12 games. Left fielder Mason Robbins also singled to extend his hit streak to 11 games.

Lowry reached his 94 pitch-count limit with one out in the seventh inning which brought in Cooper. The hard-throwing righty proceeded to strike out five in a row and six total in notching his 11th save, the most by an Intimidator pitcher since 2010. Lowry’s 11th win is also the most by an Intimidator since Cameron Bayne won 12 in 2010.

Kannapolis opens a three-game home stand with the Asheville Tourists tonight at 7:05.

Greensboro 200 000 000 — 2 9 0

Kannapolis 020 100 10x — 4 9 0

WP — Thad Lowry (11-5)

LP — Michael Mader (4-10)

S — Matt Cooper (11)