AUBURN - Rain is good for many things, but a baseball game isn't one of them.

A heavy downpour delayed Thursday's game between the Auburn Doubledays and the Vermont Lake Monsters for nearly an hour and when it finally began, most of the play outside of the pitcher's mound wasn't as great as it was the night before, for either club. The teams combined for 11 hits and five errors in the drizzle that lasted most of the game.

The Lake Monsters picked up a couple more key hits than the Doubledays did, as well as the 3-1 win at Falcon Park.

“The conditions weren't the best and we started a little bit too late,” Doubledays Manager Dennis Holmberg said. “Their starter threw a good ballgame, but you can't let a starter pitch that deep into a ballgame and not get something going, short of what we did.”

Adrian Alaniz upped his record to 4-0 after completing an impressive six innings of work. He allowed just two hits - both Ben Zeskind singles - and struck out eight batters and didn't walk one in 84 throws.

His counterpart, Kyle Walter, pitched much better than his third loss of the season might indicate. The southpaw also lasted six innings, picking up four strikeouts and scattering four hits and two runs.

“Walter came out and threw a heck of a ballgame tonight and deserved a better fate,” Holmberg said. “We played in some adverse conditions for the first five, six innings of the game. We have to chalk this up to not hitting. If we don't score enough runs for our pitcher, then we're just not going to win ballgames.”

The Lake Monsters scored in every inning they had a hit, starting with the third inning when they had three of them. The bases were loaded with no outs on three hits and an error and Boomer Whiting knocked in Daniel Lyons on an infield single. An Aaron Seuss triple coupled with a Craig Stinson fly out to deep right field in the sixth gave Vermont a two-run lead before the Doubledays found the one big hit they had been lacking in the seventh.

On the heel of his third home run of the season on Wednesday, right fielder Victor Santana belted an RBI triple to center field to score Adam Calderone, who reached on a walk off of Caleb Staudt. With one out, Santana had a chance to score the tying run, but two infield line drives by CJ Ebarb and Kelly Sweppenhiser left him stranded. The Doubledays left six runners on base total.

Another error, two hits and a walk scored Jonathan Martinez, who had stolen two consecutive bases as a pinch runner for Stinson, for the Lake Monsters in the ninth. With one last chance in the bottom of the ninth, Vermont hurler Martin Beno struck out two of Auburn's best hitters in Manny Rodriguez and Calderone before Santana hit a line drive single to right field. The rally fell short, however, when Beno caught Ebarb swinging in three pitches. Alaniz and Beno combined to strike out 13 Doubledays batters on the night.

“They were throwing a lot of strikes and making their pitches with the breaking ball,” Holmberg said. “With us, it's about being selective but also recognizing a poor breaking ball that is up in the zone that might be hit-able We just have to move up from here - we've got Hudson Valley coming in tomorrow and we'll go from there.”

At 17-13, the Doubledays are still in first place of the Pinckney Division with a 1.5 game lead over State College. Auburn hosts the Hudson Valley Renegades (13-15) today.

D-days Today

Record: 17-13

Standings: First place, 1.5-game lead

Streak: 1 loss

Next: vs. Hudson Valley, 7 p.m.