Seals pitching solid again. Defense? Not so much.

The Victoria Seals got their third consecutive quality start on Monday night, but it wasn't enough to gain the victory over the Edmonton Capitals. Edmonton scored a pair of late runs to defeat the Seals 3-2. Jino Gonzalez pitched his best game of the year, giving up only six hits and two earned runs in 7 1/3 innings of work. He lowered his ERA to 5.81, but he was tagged with the loss and his record dropped to 0-4.

First baseman (!) Matt Kavanaugh hit his second career home run in 272 professional at-bats. Kavanaugh's blast, a two-run shot, gave Victoria a 2-0 lead in the third inning. That lead held up until the 8th inning when Brian Rios made a costly error on a ground ball by Alex Chavez to allow the tying run to score. Chavez would score the winning run later in that inning. The error was Rios' fifth of the season and he now sports an .886 fielding percentage. In all of last season, Rios only made eight errors and had a .938 fielding percentage.

The only Seal to register more than one hit on Monday night was Jino Gonzalez, who went 2-for-3 against Edmonton starter Lou Pote. Victoria could only manage six hits on the night and their team batting average dropped to a league-low .243. Dale Swinford, who is hitting .326, is now the only regular on the Victoria squad that is hitting over .300.

Victoria's record is now 7 wins and 13 losses and the team is 9 games back of the first-place Chico Outlaws. But there is no need to despair -- every team's record gets reset to 0-0 on the 12th of July when the GBL pauses for their All Star break. The Seals can still make the playoffs by winning the second-half title in the North Division.