St. Charles East gets final rally at West Chicago
When it comes to baseball rallies, there's no time like the present.
St. Charles East lived by those words on Wednesday, scoring 4 runs in the top of the sixth inning and holding on for Wednesday's 8-7 Upstate Eight River victory at West Chicago.
The Saints answered immediately after the Wildcats scored 5 runs in the bottom of the fifth to claim a 7-4 advantage. Even though St. Charles East had two more innings to get the runs back, getting them all back at once eased a bunch of pressure.
"It was big to get those runs in the sixth because I think it did relax our guys a little bit," said Saints coach Len Asquini. "I thought our guys had a real good approach at the plate pretty much throughout the game. We had a lot of two-strike, two-out hits, which is always great to see. And seeing those timely hits is also great to see."
St. Charles East (18-8, 13-6) took advantage of 8 walks issued by West Chicago (11-12, 8-9) starter Fred Gosbeth and reliever Kyle Olson. Four walks came in the sixth inning when the Saints staged their rally. Austin Gift and Austin Regelbrugge singled home runs while Anthony Adduci capped the scoring with a sacrifice fly.
Saints pitcher Jake Milosch, who relieved starter and winning pitcher Mick Vyzral, retired six of the seven batters he faced to earn the save. West Chicago stranded the tying run at first base in the bottom of the seventh.
"It didn't look so great after they scored those runs, but we knew we could come back and hit it hard," said Gift, who went 3-for-4 with 2 doubles and 3 RBI. "We just had to keep the same approach we had the whole game."
West Chicago took a 2-1 lead in the second inning when Jon Sturm and Matt Dall drove in runs. St. Charles East, which staked itself to a 1-0 first-inning lead on Jake Asquini's RBI single, built a 3-2 lead on Gift's 2-run fourth-inning double. The lead grew to 4-2 in the fifth on Reid Olson's infield RBI single.
Two errors by the Saints and 4 hits allowed West Chicago to reclaim the 7-4 lead in the fifth. Peyton Seidler's single and Brandon Bouchez' groundout scored 2 runs before Brian Sullivan's 2-run single extended the margin.
"I think for the most part we played pretty well," said West Chicago coach Dan McCarthy. "The previous game against them we committed 10 errors and didn't look like we belonged on the field with them. Today we proved we belonged and we had an opportunity, and that's all you can ask for."
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