Tyler Fitzgerald's three-run homer lifts Comets over Aces, clinches series

Tyler Fitzgerald flipped the whole weekend with one swing. His three-run homer in the first inning sent the Oklahoma City Comets to a 5-3 victory over the Reno Aces on Sunday at Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark, sealing the series and turning a competitive finale into a controlled finish for a club that kept answering all week.

Oklahoma City entered the day at 28-22, Reno at 24-27, and the Comets needed exactly the kind of early punch Fitzgerald provided. A walk and a hit batsman set the table in front of him, and Fitzgerald drove the moment into left field for his fifth home run of the season. He came into the game with 20 RBIs in 91 at-bats, and the homer was the kind of production that still matters when Triple-A lineups start pressing for attention from a major league club. Fitzgerald’s bat has given Oklahoma City a real middle-order threat, and this one changed the tone of the game before the Aces could settle in.

Yu-Min Lin took the loss for Reno, but he also showed why the box score only tells part of the story. Lin was tagged for all three runs in the first, then settled down to throw five more scoreless, hitless innings. Even so, the early damage proved enough to put the Aces in catch-up mode the rest of the way. Reno scratched out runs in the third, fifth and ninth, but Oklahoma City never let the game get away. The Comets out-hit the Aces 6-5 and played error-free ball, two numbers that fit a team that knew exactly what the late innings required.

The series result fit the shape of Oklahoma City’s week. The Comets opened with a 6-3 win on Tuesday, May 19, then dropped a 7-6 game on Friday, May 22 and a 2-1 decision on Saturday, May 23 before finishing with Sunday’s closeout. The 5-3 win came before 6,005 fans and gave Oklahoma City a series victory that felt bigger than a single afternoon. Fitzgerald’s homer was the swing that made the set look inevitable, and for a team trying to stack quality results, it was the kind of at-bat that carries real weight beyond one box score.