Matesi, Wauconda shut down Grant
Face to face, Wauconda right-hander Tim Matesi wouldn’t scare anyone.
The senior is average in both height (5-feet-10) and weight (170 pounds).
What might frighten you is that tantalizing slow curveball he tosses at opposing hitters. It perfectly sets up his better-than-average fastball.
On Monday at home, the Bulldogs of Wauconda (15-9) took another important step toward clinching the Prairie Division of the North Suburban Conference. Matesi struck out 11 Grant hitters in a 7-0 win.
“I was positioning strikes and getting groundballs,” Matesi said. “My curve had a lot of movement today. I was throwing it a lot on my first pitch.”
Matesi received all the run support he would need in a 2-run first inning.
After 2 leadoff walks, Jeremy Wagner and catcher Shawn Sundquist drove in runs with RBI hits.
Matesi took it from there. The Northern Illinois University-bound senior struck out at least one hitter in each inning and closed the game with a flourish — fanning the side in the seventh inning.
“He had good command of all of his pitches,” said Wauconda coach Bill Sliker. “He was able to throw any pitch at any time and he never got into a jam.”
It wasn’t like Matesi was throwing no-hit ball. He allowed a screaming opposite-field double to Grant sophomore Jake Ring in the third inning. But Ring only advanced to third before the inning ended.
Grant’s Zach Niedrich also roped a double, leading off the fifth inning. Again, Matesi wriggled out of trouble, getting two groundouts and registering a strikeout.
The left-handed Ring had his moments on the mound for Grant. He would seem to have trouble after registering two outs.
“I thought he did a nice job,” said Grant coach Dave Behm. “He kept us in the game.”
Two-out trouble reared its head in the fourth inning. Wauconda junior center fielder Jake Ziolkowski did the damage with 2-run double, making it 4-0.
Wauconda scored 2 runs in the last two innings without the benefit of a hit. In the fifth, Ring struck out the side, but an error and a dropped third strike produced a run. In the sixth, 2 errors led to another run without a hit.
Behm was disappointed to see his team shut out, as Grant dropped to 8-19.
“We just couldn’t scratch those runs in,” Behm said. “We didn’t make a ton of adjustments.”
Wauconda leadoff hitter Tony Kaminsky reached base all four times. Wauconda outhit Grant 6-5.