Glenbard South steady behind Wilkes, beats St. Francis

A batter can grow old waiting for Glenbard South's fielders to make a mistake.

The slick-fielding Raiders made play after play behind winning pitcher Jess Wilkes in Saturday morning's 9-2 nonconference victory against St. Francis in Glen Ellyn.

"Our infield is the best," Raiders catcher Jackie Wrona said. "I am 100 percent confident if it stays on the ground, they're going to get it."

"All of them do a great job," Raiders coach Julie Fonda added. "(Amanda) Fazzari at third, Tess (DiIorio at first base) made a nice play today. (Brianna Meath at second base) jammed her thumb and Madeline (Peterson) comes in and gets the first ball hit to her. I can't complain about them. They do a great job. There's a lot of confidence. Wilkes knows if she pitches a groundball it's probably going to be an out."

Glenbard South (20-2) got off to a great start, scoring 5 times in the bottom of the first inning.

"It gives Wilkes a lot of confidence, it gives us a lot of confidence, and it puts their backs up against the wall," Fonda said. "It was nice to see."

"The key to that inning was not making the play on the first hitter (Meath) on that line drive to center field," St. Francis coach Ralph Remus said. "If we get that out, I think it's a whole different inning. We keep their speed off the bases. In the fifth and sixth inning when we made plays on bunts to start the inning, if we don't make those plays those are big innings again."

Meath scored her second run of the game in the second inning to make it 6-0, and Hannah Davey scored in the third.

Meanwhile, Wilkes (14-1) kept the ball in the infield through the first 10 batters until St. Francis' Laura Behnke broke up the perfect game by coaxing a one-out walk out of a full count in the fourth inning. Brie Pasquale followed with a clean two-strike single to end the no-hitter, and Paige Davis drove in both Behnke and Pasquale with a double to left field that one-hopped the fence.

"They made every play in the field they had to make," Remus said. "The 2 runs we got, we earned them. We hit the ball hard. It just wasn't enough."

Wilkes got the Spartans (15-7) to hit at the Raiders' fielders again, and that was the end of the Spartans' threat.

"She was pitching great," Raiders catcher Jackie Wrona said. "She's amazing at hitting her spots. Her (screwball) is just phenomenal."

The Raiders responded to St. Francis' 2-run outburst by getting those runs back in the bottom of the fourth when Wrona doubled to left to drive in Maddie Glab and Jane Trzaska. Wrona finished with a pair of doubles and 3 RBI.

"The past few days I was ahead of the ball and I went and did some extra practice and I just came out ripping," Wrona said. "It was awesome."