Baseball: St. Charles East hangs on, downs South Elgin

South Elgin made things interesting, at least.

Two outs from being 10-runned by St. Charles East two different times, the Storm's bats exploded in the final three innings and South Elgin wound up with the tying run at the plate to end the game.

Andrew Conn finally got the last out to close out the 15-13 win for the Saints, who led 11-0 and 13-3 in the Upstate Eight baseball matchup in South Elgin.

With warm temperatures and the wind blowing out toward left field for most of the game, the teams combined for 29 hits and 5 home runs.

Charlie Charpentier smacked a grand slam to help the Saints build the big lead. Thomas Schroeder added a 2-run homer and Ryan Richa a solo shot for the Saints (10-7-1, 9-3).

Austin Doty and Pat Keaty homered back-to-back for the Storm in the sixth.

Saint starter Jeremy Cox held the Storm to 2 hits over four innings.

"What happened after that tells you a little bit about what he did on the hill," said St. Charles coach Len Asquini. "He threw exceptionally well to keep these guys at a zero. Unfortunately, we couldn't finish it."

The Storm (5-3, 2-3) loaded the bases with one out in the third, but Cox got out of it unscathed.

South Elgin teed off on the Saint bullpen, scoring 13 runs over the final 3 innings.

The Storm scored 5 times in the sixth keyed by Doty's and Keaty's homers. They added 5 more in the seventh. Nate Gomez, Logan Romasanta and Nathan Smith doubled in the inning. Smith's blast made it 15-13, bringing up the tying run. But Conn got the called third strike to finally finish it off.

"On a day like today, the wind's blowing out, you never know," said South Elgin assistant coach Ben Erickson. "I'm happy our kids battled back and had the opportunity to put themselves ahead, but you can't put yourself in that predicament right off the bat."

Charpentier had 2 hits and drove in 5 runs for SCE. John DelloStritto, Patrick Griffin, Schroeder, Colton Conn, and Andrew Conn all had 2 hits for St. Charles East.

Romasanta finished with 3 hits, including a pair of doubles for South Elgin. Doty, Keaty, Gomez, and Smith had 2 apiece.