Lake Zurich edges Antioch in NSC title game

Christina Sandstedt’s perfectly placed bunt died on the chalk line, scoring her speedy Lake Zurich teammate Katie Brown with the winning run.

But the softball rivalry between the Bears and Antioch lives on.

The perennial Lake County powers played another lively one — extra innings, again — in the North Suburban Conference championship at Lake Zurich on Thursday.

“That’s the tradition,” Bears coach Michaela Towne said. “If we play Antioch in the championship game, then we’ve got to go into extra innings.

And so they did.

This time, Lake Zurich avenged a pair of extra-inning defeats in the title game the last two springs by prevailing 7-6 in nine.

Last year Antioch won 2-1 in nine innings, as well, and captured the 2009 NSC title game with a 2-0 win over Lake Zurich in 15 innings.

“The third time’s the charm,” said winning pitcher Megan Mattera, who blasted a long, 3-run homer in the first. “The feeling’s great. I’m happy. The team’s happy. We’re all happy.”

Antioch wasn’t happy.

“I could see the spot in the dirt where the ball was,” Antioch coach Jeff Tylka said of Sandstedt’s walk-off bunt single that stopped rolling 10 feet down the third-base line. By the time pitcher Olivia Duehr picked up the ball, Brown, courtesy-running for Mattera, was racing across home plate.

“It’s not on the white line,” Tylka added.

Antioch (23-8) overcame Mattera’s center-field bomb (her seventh homer) by scoring 4 runs in the fourth. But the visitors couldn’t protect that lead, nor advantages of 5-4 heading into the bottom of the seventh and 6-5 going into the last of the ninth.

“No matter where the bunt was, we did it to ourselves,” Tylka said. “We had a chance to tack on a run, and we didn’t. I can’t say we didn’t come up with a big hit, because we had so many big hits. Both teams did. It was just a great high school softball game. It was phenomenal.”

The Bears’ heroes also included Alli McGinnis, whose bases-loaded sacrifice fly in the seventh forced extra innings. McGinnis’ RBI single in the ninth pulled Lake Zurich (18-7) even again and brought Sandstedt to the plate with runners on second and third and one out.

“My bunt wouldn’t have meant anything if Alli hadn’t gotten those hits,” Sandstedt said. “She really made it a lot easier for me to go up. It was all her.”

“I live for those (situations),” said an excited McGinnis, who also had a first-inning single. “(Duehr) was getting ahead in the count, and I wasn’t really laying off those high pitches that were balls. Eventually, I caught onto it. I was really happy to get that hit (in the ninth).”

Antioch, which had gotten a 2-run double from sophomore Amber Larson and a run-scoring single from freshman Sage Keyes in its four-run fourth, went up 5-4 in the sixth on Sam Kozenski’s RBI double.

Sophomore Katie Keefe gave the lead back to the Sequoits in the ninth with a two-out single off Mattera that scored recent call-up Keyes (2-for-4).

Duehr and Katie Phillips, another sophomore, also had doubles for Antioch.

“Our underclassmen have definitely been great, and I’m so proud of them,” said the Northwestern-bound Duehr, getting choked up. “They’re making my season so worthwhile.”

Freshman Carlee Parsons (3-for-5, double) started Lake Zurich’s ninth-inning rally with her third straight hit. After freshman Maria Schroeder (2-for-4, RBI triple, double) popped out, Antioch had no choice but to face Mattera, after the Miami University recruit had walked her last three at-bats on a total of 13 pitches.

This time Mattera chopped a single through the hole between third and short.

McGinnis followed with her game-tying single into center.

“We weren’t going to let her be the only person to beat us, so we made the team beat us,” Duehr said of Mattera, her Illinois Chill 18U Gold teammate. “And they beat us.”

With the winning run, Brown, on third, Sandstedt swung and missed. She then took a pitch off the plate.

“I was trying not to think at all,” Sandstedt said.

Towne made the junior think by giving her the bunt sign with a 1-1 count.

“Katie Brown is the fastest girl in the program,” Towne said. “I was thinking that if ‘Tinah’ (Sandstedt) could just lay down a bunt, then (Brown) is going to score, no problem.”

Sandstedt executed.

Fair ball.

“It just sat on the line,” said Towne, who viewed the bunt from the third-base coach’s area. “If anybody has the best view of it, I do. I’m standing right there. ... That was a perfect bunt.”

“We had a lot of important people step up,” Sandstedt said. “This was definitely a team effort the whole game.”