By ERIC BENEVIDES

Sports writer

PAWTUCKET -- One-run ballgames and the Pawtucket Red Sox have gone hand-in-hand over these first couple of months, and for the second straight contest, the McCoy Stadium faithful was treated to another tight affair with the Buffalo Bisons.
Like Saturday night’s game, the PawSox stopped the Bisons by a 3-2 score, but unlike that contest, the hosts needed extra innings to nail down the win and Jonathan Van Every’s four-pitch walk with the bases loaded and one out in the bottom of the 11th inning to produce the game-winning run.
This contest was scoreless for the first 10 innings, but in the top of the 11th, the Bisons, who sport an International League-worst 9-26 record, took a 2-0 lead off reliever Jose Vaquedano when light-hitting second baseman Argenis Reyes belted a two-run homer into the visitors’ bullpen in right field.
But the PawSox (21-15) answered right back in their half of the inning and parlayed five of their eight hits in the game and Van Every’s free pass into a magical three-run uprising off New York Mets prospect Eddie Kunz.
Paul McAnulty got the rally going with a double into the right-field corner, and after Travis Denker lined a single to right, Angel Chavez cut the Bisons’ lead in half by plating McAnulty with a sharp ground single to right.
A pinch-hit single by Sandy Madera (Pawtucket’s first pinch hit of the year) loaded the bases, but Kunz responded by whiffing Iggy Suarez for the first out.
Freddy Guzman then tied the score by scoring Denker with an infield single that saw Bisons shortstop Jonathan Malo glove Guzman’s hard shot with a dive to his right and quickly throw the ball to third, but a second too late to nab Chavez.
That brought Van Every to the plate and the 6,854 in attendance to their feet, and Van Every didn’t see anything close to a strike as he took his walk and Chavez trotted home with the game-winner.
“That was a great comeback,” said Johnson, who has seen 39 percent of his team’s games (14) decided by a run. “You give up two runs in the top of an inning and then get three back in your half to win the game. That was great to see.” 
The McCoy faithful was also treated to another excellent performance from 22-year-old pitcher Michael Bowden, who fired eight scoreless innings in a no-decision that saw him strike out seven batters, walk four, yield three hits, and lower his league-leading ERA to 0.86.
“Besides a couple of walks, I felt very comfortable,” added Bowden. “I felt like I was getting ahead of a lot of guys and throwing all of my pitches for strikes, so besides those little funks I got into with a few batters, I felt like I was throwing the ball really well.”
Bowden, who threw 93 pitches (61 for strikes) before exiting the game, was hooked up in a nice pitchers’ duel with another Mets prospect, Dillon Gee. He fired 6 1/3 scoreless innings, fanning eight and allowing five hits and three walks before leaving the game when his pitch count rose above 100 in the seventh.
The PawSox’s best chance to score off Gee came in the second, when with one out, Denker doubled into the gap in right-center and went to third on a base hit to left by Chavez. But Gee left both runners in scoring position by getting catcher John Otness to pop out in foul ground and Suarez to ground out.
In the seventh, both teams got a runner to third, but were never able to bring it home. The Bisons got their runner there when Reyes led off with a single and went to second and third on wild pitches by Bowden, but a groundout halted that threat.
In the bottom of the frame, Otness drew a leadoff walk off Gee and Guzman and Chip Ambres also drew walks off former PawSox reliever Jon Switzer to load the bases with two gone, but Switzer struck out Chris Carter to end the inning.     
After southpaw Javier Lopez delivered a 1-2-3 ninth inning and Vaquedano blanked the Bisons in the 10th, the visitors did their damage with two outs in the 11th, as Cory Sullivan singled to center and Reyes followed with his first homer of the season, a shot that just found its way into the bullpen. 
“I was waiting a long time for someone to flip one in that bullpen because of the (weather) conditions today,” said Johnson. “Left field wasn’t going to do anything because (the breeze) was blowing, but it looked like it was coming across the field and if someone hit a decent shot to right field, it was going.”
McAnuly, Chavez, and Denker each finished the game with two hits, and for Chavez and Denker, their multiple-hit games couldn’t have come at a better time. Chavez entered the game with just three hits in his last 26 at-bats, and Denker had just one hit in his last 14 trips.