Baseball: South Elgin falls behind early, storms back to beat West Chicago, maintain UEC lead

Entering the game with a 5-game winning streak, South Elgin’s baseball team received a rude awakening from host West Chicago in the first inning of their Upstate Eight Conference clash Thursday afternoon.

Batting around, the Wildcats (5-16, 5-8) grabbed a 5-0 lead thanks in part to an outfield error, 2 walks, RBI singles from Ryan Bell and Lucas Wheat (2 for 3), and a 2-run single off the bat of Dylan Mason.

It didn’t take the Storm (16-9, 11-1) long to answer.

South Elgin sent 13 batters to the plate during its 9-run second, taking advantage of 4 Wildcat errors, an RBI single from Zach Barkho, Aiden Bernau’s RBI double, and punctuated by senior first baseman Ryan Mirante’s 2-run double to right-center.

The Storm went on to win, 14-6.

“I’m glad they reacted that way,” Storm coach Jim Kating said of his team’s early comeback. “When you come out and you don’t throw strikes, it doesn’t matter what the team is. They hit some balls really well.

“We put ourselves in that predicament. I’m glad we did that (scored 9 runs in the second), but we can’t start out that way.”

Mirante, who led off the second with a single, finished 3 for 3 with a pair of RBI, including his 2 hits in the marathon frame.

“I was looking to get up and swing early in the count because I’ve been getting behind 0-2 a lot,” said Mirante. “I changed my swing a little bit. I’m striding out a little earlier, so it was good to get some good swings.”

Trailing 5-0 after an inning was a different experience of late for the Storm.

“We’ve been up in a lot of our games, so it was good to see that we could go down 5-0, battle back and keep our composure,” said Mirante.

South Elgin tacked on solo runs in the third and fourth before adding a pair of insurance tallies in the fifth.

Lucas Seifrid’s sacrifice fly brought home Jesus Contreras in the seventh to cap the scoring for the Storm, which received solid bullpen performances from sophomores Jonathan Niksich (2 IP, 3 strikeouts) and Kyle Iott (2 IP, 4 strikeouts).

“We’re still working on things,” said Kating. “We’re still trying to get some stuff done in regard to fundamentals.”

With the win, the Storm remains atop the UEC standings, a game ahead of West Aurora (10-2).

“In the opinion of our coaching staff, we’ve only played three games the way we’re supposed to play, so we still have a lot of room to improve,” said Kating. “I think the kids are up to the challenge of doing that.”

EJ Huffman and Sam Zalak each drove in runs for the Wildcats, while Tommy Doyle went 1 for 2 with a pair of walks.

“It was good to see the kids come out ready to play,” said Wildcats coach TJ Nall, “but we can’t give a good club like that four outs, yet alone six or seven. We threw the ball around a little bit.

“If it’s one error, that’s OK, but we can’t quite handle 2, 3, 4 miscues in one inning. You’ve got to find a way to turn the page — be mentally tough to make the next play and expect the baseball to be hit to you.”