Reno’s inside-the-park HR foils 51s

Chris Rahl led off the bottom of the eighth inning with a tiebreaking inside-the-park home run, lifting the Reno Aces to an 8-7 victory over the 51s on Monday in a Pacific Coast League game at Reno.

Las Vegas, which fell to 12-13, was unable to hold leads of 3-0 and 6-3.

Chris Purcey (1-1) relieved Jesse Carlson for the 51s to begin the eighth and Rahl greeted Purcey by hitting his first homer of the season off the 424-foot sign in right-center field.

Las Vegas went ahead 3-0 in the second on Chris Aguila's two-run triple and Jarrett Hoffpauir's RBI single. Reno tied it in the third against 51s starter Zach Jackson, keyed by RBI hits by Mark Hallberg and Ryan Roberts.

The 51s again surged ahead with three runs in the fifth, getting an RBI double by Brett Wallace and a two-run homer by Chris Lubanski, his seventh.

Reno battled back to take a 7-6 lead with a run in the fifth and three in the sixth, getting a two-run single by Jeff Bailey. Luis Figueroa's RBI groundout in the top of the eighth got Las Vegas even.

Aguila, Hoffpauir and Wallace had two hits apiece for the 51s, and Hallberg had three for the Aces.

The teams play at 11:35 a.m. today in the second game of a four-game series.