Baseball: York sweeps Downers Grove North
Three games, 33 runs scored and a new outlook on the baseball season.
York's bats continued to mash in Thursday's 8-4 West Suburban Silver victory over Downers Grove North in Elmhurst.
The come-from-behind win capped a three-game sweep by the Dukes, who extended their winning streak to six in a row in a stretch of games where they've averaged 10 runs and got wins from five pitchers.
They'll take that momentum - on the heels of three straight losses last week - into Friday's key Silver matchup against Lyons Twp.
"We've been struggling at the plate lately and mainly this week we turned it around and got the bats going," said Dukes senior Jake Hadawi, the winning pitcher in Tuesday's game against Downers North. "I don't know why but we take a while to get used to the pitchers and get the bats moving. That's something we'll have to work on."
Even with six-inning victories in the first two games of the series, Thursday marked the third straight time the Dukes (13-4, 6-2) fell behind to Downers North (7-10, 6-5), which came into the series on a five-game winning streak of its own.
Jack Carr gave the Trojans a 4-0 lead in the top of the third with a 3-run double but York answered with 3 runs in the bottom of the third, sparked by RBI singles from Mike Pastuovic and Hadawi.
Dan Brown singled in the tying run in the fourth, and then the Dukes took control with a 3-run fifth. Hadawi doubled in another run and Brown added a sacrifice fly.
Crooked numbers on the scoreboard were the last thing Downers North needed to see from York. The Dukes posted eight of them in three games.
"When we're all locked in, we can play," said Downers North coach Kyle Briscoe. "We have the ability. But when we come off the rails, we come off the rails. How do we move past that one error? That's something we're struggling with. We've got to find a way to get back in when we don't make a play."
Kellen Gilmartin was strong in 6⅓ innings for York, allowing 3 hits in the final three-plus innings. Ian Steinorth, Ryan Ross, Pastuovic, Hadawi and Brown all had 2 hits while T.J. Drohan and Carr went 2-for-4 for Downers North.
"This group, no matter who's in the lineup, they seem to understand about making adjustments every pitch and every at-bat," said York coach Dave Kalal. "We've had a lot of games like this where we figure it out and chip away."
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