Lara, Sounds use five extra-base hits to top WooSox 5-3

Nashville absorbed Worcester’s late pressure and still walked out of First Horizon Park with a 5-3 win, the kind of early-season test that says more than a routine victory. The Sounds built a 5-1 cushion through four innings, matched a season high with five extra-base hits, and leaned on another big night from Luis Lara to hold off a WooSox club that would not go quietly.

The timing made the result matter even more. Nashville and Worcester both entered the game at 10-8, and this was the Worcester Red Sox’s first-ever trip to Nashville, with the six-game set opening the previous night when the Sounds won 9-4. That turned Wednesday’s matchup into an early measuring-stick game in the International League, and Nashville passed it by answering every Worcester move with one of its own.

Worcester struck first after drawing a pair of two-out walks against Logan Henderson and following with an RBI single. Nashville answered immediately. Jett Williams opened the home half with a triple, then Cooper Pratt lined an opposite-field double for his first Triple-A extra-base hit to tie it. Pratt kept it going in the second, reaching again before Lara delivered a two-RBI single for a 3-1 lead.

The Sounds kept stacking pressure in the fourth. Williams walked, stole second and scored on another Pratt hit, giving Pratt a multi-hit, multi-RBI night. Jeferson Quero added a sacrifice fly later in the inning, and Nashville’s offense had already done enough damage to put the game in control. Lara added a double later and finished with his second straight three-hit performance, his fifth three-hit game of the season. The Brewers’ No. 12 prospect keeps looking less like a hot streak and more like a middle-order problem for opposing pitchers.

Henderson, Milwaukee’s No. 7 prospect, worked past the shaky start, and the bullpen did the rest. Joe Corbett threw 1.2 scoreless, hitless innings with two strikeouts, Brian Fitzpatrick extended his scoreless streak to 7.2 innings over seven straight outings to start the season, and Drew Rom allowed only one run while keeping Worcester within reach but never close enough. The WooSox trimmed the margin late, but Nashville kept answering, and that is what made this feel like more than another early win.