Persistence pays as Libertyville tops Mundelein

Libertyville's Andi Katz skied a flyball to deep left field in the bottom of the seventh and watched what looked like might be a walk-off homer.

When the softball fell out of the reach of Mundelein's left fielder, who had circled and backpedaled, Katz raced to second base with a game-tying RBI double.

"I was going hard all the way," Katz said. "I wanted to see where (the ball) landed. I was watching the left fielder all the way."

When Jamie Stevens followed Katz's clutch hit with one of her own, likewise, the sophomore didn't initially react jubilantly.

"It didn't feel great," Stevens said of her two-out single to center field that scored Katz from second with the winning run. "It felt great when it dropped."

Libertyville felt euphoric after Stevens' second walk-off hit of the season lifted the Wildcats to a stunning, 11-10 win in Tuesday's North Suburban Lake Division game.

It was a crushing loss for Mundelein (19-10, 3-7), which led 10-3 going into the bottom of the sixth.

"That doesn't sit well," Mustangs coach Brett Wilhelm said.

The win was exactly what Libertyville (21-8, 7-3) needed. The victory snapped a four-game losing streak, avenged last month's 6-5 loss and kept the Wildcats in the thick of the NSC Lake race. The winners scored 5 runs in the sixth and 3 in the seventh.

"We talk about it all the time - playing all 21 outs," Libertyville coach Elissa Wisniewski said. "Offensively today, that's what we did. We made really good adjustments. We started hitting the ball hard."

"We all kept our heads up and picked each other up the whole time," said Katz, who was 2-for-3 with 2 doubles and 2 walks. "We finally reached the goal of winning."

Mundelein jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first thanks to Abbey Rosenow's RBI double off the right-field fence and Maggie Mahar's two-out, 2-run single. Libertyville pulled even after four, but the Mustangs went back in front by scoring 3 runs in the fifth. Lauren Fairweather's 2-run double snapped the tie, and Amanda Diaz's RBI single capped the inning.

Mundelein then tacked on 4 runs in the sixth. Rosenow ripped another long double to score a run, and Hannah Bulgart followed with a pinch-hit, 2-run single. Courtesy runner Danielle Beelow then purposely got caught in a rundown between first and second, allowing the Mustangs' 10th run to cross the plate.

Down to its final six outs, Libertyville never lost confidence.

"We always had it in us," said Stevens, whose homer in walk-off fashion beat Stevenson in early April. "We have enough talent to get it done."

Michaela Mooney, who pitched 6 innings in relief of starter Haley Alban to get the win, started the bottom of the sixth by ripping a double off the fence. One out later, Tayler Oberman, who had a pair of RBI doubles earlier in the game, hit a 2-run homer. The Wildcats then loaded the bases thanks to singles by Jessie Lauret and Stevens (3-for-5) and a walk to Katz, before Madi Dembinski (2-for-4) cleared the bases with a double.

Mooney (2-for-3) started the Libertyville seventh by getting hit by a pitch. After a strikeout and fielder's-choice groundball off the bat of Oberman (3-for-5), speedy-slapper Lauret (3-for-4) legged out her third single. Mundelein threw the ball away, allowing Oberman to score, as Lauret slid safely into third.

Katz was next, and her flyball looked like it might clear the fence down the line.

"I thought I popped it up, actually," Katz said.

When Stevens' soft line drive dropped into shallow center field, Katz raced around and scored without a throw.

"Hopefully this is a learning experience," Wilhelm said. "We are a young team. That's not something I want to use as a reason why this happened, but hopefully now we understand the situation. When this time comes again, hopefully we're not timid about making plays, (but rather) we're going to make plays."

Nicole Parney suffered the tough-luck loss, as her outfielders misplayed flyballs all game long.

"Nicole did great," said Wilhelm, whose team got 2 hits apiece from Karlee Busscher, Maria DeVito, Rosenow and Mahar. "These are plays in the outfield and infield that we typically make. ... I haven't seen us throw the ball around like that all year, really."