Clutch hitting powers Hoffman Estates

When things aren’t going well for Hoffman Estates, errors have typically been the undoing.

The Hawks committed six of them on Wednesday at Schaumburg, but the team’s offense, along with starting pitcher Jimmy Ward, picked them up in a 10-5 win over the Saxons in Mid-Suburban West action.

Hoffman Estates (10-14, 4-7) got plenty of timely hitting, scoring 7 runs with two outs to put coach Paul Groot’s 600th win at Schaumburg (13-12, 5-6) on hold.

Groot’s former assistant coach, Hoffman Estates skipper Todd Meador, was pleased with the way his offense picked up the defense.

“That’s what good teams do,” Meador said. “When one area isn’t going well, you have to find ways to pick yourselves up. They made a few mistakes and we capitalized.”

Back-to-back hits from Riley Mugerditchian and Zach Hommowun to lead off the third set up the Hawks’ first run.

With two outs and the bases loaded, Mike Gordon took the full-count offering from Schaumburg starter Pat Bellinger right back where it came from for a 2-run single.

Ward helped his own cause by following it up with a 2-run single into left-center and a 5-0 lead.

“All year, we have been talking about putting teams away and capitalizing on situations like that,” Ward said. “Coming through with two outs is big.”

That momentum was short-lived as the Saxons answered with 3 runs in the bottom half of the inning thanks to 3 Hawks errors and RBI singles from Matt Brancato and Colin Bethran, who each had 3 hits for Schaumburg.

But Hoffman Estates refused to let the poor defensive effort hurt. The Hawks rebounded with 3 two-out runs in the fifth as Ward collected his third RBI and Brian Cvitkovich contributed a run-scoring single.

“We have talked all year that you win a lot of games when you play well with two outs, defensively and offensively,” Meador said. “Today, you score seven with two outs, you’re doing something right.”

Ward kept the ball down in the final four innings to limit Schaumburg’s offense. The junior scattered 9 hits and yielded 3 earned runs in tossing a complete game.

“We talked about picking each other when things fall apart like that,” Ward said. “We have to make sure to pick it back up and make the plays.”

“I give credit to their kid,” Groot said of Ward. “He had us out in front all day. We made some errors at critical times that hurt us. We had runners on base and we didn’t come through with the clutch it.”