Busse, Hersey like taste of victory

Ryan Busse delivered another mouth-watering performance for Hersey on Tuesday afternoon.

And if the senior left-hander continues his steady diet of quality pitches over the plate there will be a tasty payoff at the end of the baseball season.

Busse just missed his second shutout in as many starts and the Hersey (6-0) offensive menu included homers from the top five hitters in its order in an 11-1 nonconference win in six innings over visiting Dundee-Crown (2-2).

"I'm a lot more relaxed this year," said Busse, who won only once as a junior. "Last year was rough and a lot of nerves got to me.

"One big goal is 7 wins and the big man (coach Bob Huber) will have me over for dinner."

Busse is starting to think even bigger after throwing a 4-hitter with 6 strikeouts and 3 walks. He threw 56 of his 89 pitches for strikes with a changeup that kept D-C off-balance.

A leadoff error led to a bases-loaded, two-out wild pitch for D-C's only run in the sixth.

"My changeup was working really good and was a great pitch today," said Busse, who shut out Springfield Griffin in his first start.

"Ryan was around the plate and threw strikes," Huber said. "There's nothing else you can ask for."

Except another quick start as Hersey scored in the first inning for the fifth time. Alex Lee reached on a two-base error and Domenic Biagini's sacrifice fly to left was dropped for an error.

Chris Polinski then slammed an 0-1 curve from junior Scott Nowicke off a house in left-center for his first homer.

"It's a motivator," Polinski said of the early outbursts. "When we start hitting the first couple of innings it gets us riled up. That's usually what starts the big stuff."

The powerball picked up in the third with solo shots from Lee and Biagini and a 2-run blast by Steve Danielak. Jake Knauss hit a solo homer in the fourth.

Dalton Farel had a game-ending RBI single in the sixth and Dan Gierman also had an RBI single. D-C's 7 errors led to 7 unearned runs.

"I don't think it's possible to give up 5 homers and commit 7 errrors and not get 10-runned and we almost pulled it off," said D-C coach Jon Sawyer. "Our defense has been pretty strong. Obviously today, for whatever reason, we couldn't put a fork in the ball. Hopefully it's a one-day thing."