Comets fall 4-3 to Knights, split series in Charlotte

Tommy Edman kept moving toward a Dodgers return with a three-hit day, a stolen base and two runs scored, but the Oklahoma City Comets could not cash in late and dropped a 4-3 decision to the Charlotte Knights at Truist Field. After a week in which the Comets had been stacking big numbers, Sunday’s tighter, lower-scoring game became a sharper test of who can still produce when the runs do not come in bunches.

Charlotte struck first on Ryan Galanie’s solo homer in the opening inning, then Oklahoma City answered in the third when James Tibbs III delivered an RBI groundout and Jack Suwinski followed with an RBI single. The Comets briefly looked set up for another of their higher-octane finishes, but Charlotte reclaimed control in the fifth. Andy Weber singled in two runs, and Rikuu Nishida dropped down a safety squeeze to make it 4-2.

That squeeze mattered as much as any swing in the series. Nishida entered the game with a .324 average and 16 stolen bases in 2026 MiLB play, and the play fit a Charlotte club that had already shown it could win different kinds of games during the six-game homestand. Oklahoma City had scored six or more runs in each of its previous six games, yet Sunday forced the lineup to manufacture against a slimmer margin and a different pace.

Tibbs kept the Comets alive with a two-out RBI double in the eighth, trimming the deficit to one, but Oklahoma City could not complete the comeback. The late push gave more evidence that Tibbs is carrying real value in leverage spots, while Suwinski’s RBI single and Edman’s steady production continued to stand out in a series that had plenty of moving parts for Los Angeles to monitor.

Jackson Ferris struck out a season-high six, but the 22-year-old left-hander allowed four runs in the state where he was born, Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Ryder Ryan, meanwhile, worked 2.2 hitless innings in his home state and gave the Comets a needed bridge on a day when the margin for error stayed thin from the first inning to the last.

The game drew 5,628 fans, started at 5:09 p.m. EDT and lasted 2 hours, 13 minutes in 88-degree, partly cloudy weather with a 12 mph wind. The finale closed a six-game set that was the first time Charlotte had ever hosted the Dodgers’ Triple-A affiliate at Truist Field, and the split left Oklahoma City with a 5-7 mark in June after the Comets dropped three of the final four games in Charlotte. It also marked Oklahoma City’s first road series without a win since mid-April, a reminder that even productive lineups can be pushed to the edge when the game tightens.