Elgin's Roth now enjoying success on diamond

The Tom Roth era in Elgin High School sports has kicked into a higher gear.

After quarterbacking the football team for two seasons and playing a key role as a guard for the basketball team during its recent run to a sectional championship, Roth, a junior, is demonstrating this spring that baseball might be his best sport.

After tossing a complete-game victory against rival Larkin last week, the right hander improved to 2-1 by shutting out East Aurora on Monday, a performance highlighted by his 15 strikeouts.

"I was feeling it, I guess," Roth said. "The curveball was actually working really good. I was mixing it up and fooling them. I challenged the East Aurora hitters with the fastball. It was pretty much first-pitch fastball, and then mix it up from there."

Elgin baseball records are incomplete but Dave Cooklin, who coached the Maroons for 25 seasons prior to his retirement in 2006, said Roth's 15 strikeout performance "could very well be No. 1" in school history.

Roth has only given up 1 earned run in 17 innings this season, which equates to an ERA of 0.41.

On Tuesday, Roth hit a home run against the Tomcats, the third straight game he parked one.

It was all in a day's work for the athletic junior, who simply loves to compete, whether that competition takes place on the gridiron, hardwood, diamond or in a classroom.

"In Spanish class we always play this game called flyswatter, where two people each have a flyswatter and on the overhead projector there are pictures," Roth said. "The teacher will say a vocab word and the first person to slap the right picture is the winner. We always have competitions in that class, so it's fun."

Roth's competitive instinct can be contagious.

"The team definitely feeds off him when he's playing well," Elgin baseball coach David Foerster said. "That gives them a jolt of confidence. It's always good as a coach when your best player is willing to work the hardest. Other guys see that as an example and work just as hard."

Red Storm Rising: South Elgin swept a two-game Upstate Eight Conference series from Bartlett this week, which was significant for two reasons:

No. 1, South Elgin High School's population is culled partially from students who would have otherwise attended Bartlett, including Storm seniors Matt Wright, Kyle Daker and Ryan Kellner, the latter of whom earned the victory Tuesday despite giving up 4 home runs in the wind-blown series finale.

No. 2, South Elgin coach Jim Kating coached underclass-level baseball at Bartlett for eight years before getting the nod to run his own varsity program.

The series victory evened the Storm's record at 3-3. They improved to 4-3 on Wednesday with an 11-3 victory at East Aurora.

South Elgin finished its inaugural season in 2007 with a record of 10-24.

"I'm excited," Kating said after the sweep. "We see a little light at the end of the tunnel now with how we can play if we stay focused and get after people. It was kind of nice because Ryan pitched his first game and gave up those 4 home runs with the wind blowing out, but we scored all our runs the hard way.

"That's just a testament to the kids getting on base and doing the little things we've been doing lately."

Gator scraps: Crystal Lake South is off to a 6-2 start under first-year coach Brian Bogda after Wednesday's impressive 12-6 victory against visiting Huntley, which slipped to 9-5.

"The guys are really jelling and working well together," Bogda said. "We've gotten some nice pitching performances and we've been scoring a lot of runs, too. Offensively, we're doing a great job."

The Gator offense was held down temporarily on Tuesday, however, when Johnsburg's C.J. Fiedorowicz held them to a lone run on 4 hits in 6 innings.

But CL South bounced back for 12 runs against Huntley on Wednesday, albeit, Huntley didn't throw either of its top starters: Nate Prokuski or Tanner Funke.

James Vazquez, Tony Pauls and Ryan Kelley each homered against Huntley, giving the Gators 10 home runs this season. But that's not the way they typically generate offense.

"We're more of the scrappy type of team," Bogda said. "We're more of a shoot-it-to-the-gap, bunt-'em-over-and-get-'em-in kind of team. That's the style I like."

Warriors rolling: Westminster Christian improved to 9-3-1 this season when Brandon Siewert (3-0) tossed a 5-inning, 1-hitter at Timothy Christian on Wednesday.

It was yet another impressive win for the Warriors, a Class 1A school that defeated Class 4A Glenbard East 10-4 last Saturday shortly after they had defeated Class 2A St. Edward 15-2.

"We have four guys batting over .400 and we've hit 10 home runs for the year," coach Jeff Moeller said. "We're averaging 9 runs a game.

"We just need to tighten up our defense, just little things we have to sharpen up."

Stats please: The Daily Herald will begin publishing area statistics in Sports Extra next week. Coaches, please fax your stats no later than the end of the day Monday to (847) 608-0987 or e-mail to prepsports@dailyherald.com.