Baseball: Elwood’s 8th inning homer gives Aurora Christian wild regional win

Kaleb Elwood considers himself capable of being a power hitter, but the home run production has not yet matched.

The Aurora Christian senior catcher and Wisconsin-Platteville commit has had many hard-hit balls hit the fence this season. He has a theory why.

“My hardest hits, I feel, are always on the line and they’ll hit the fence,” Elwood said. “I never get the right launch angle so it’s always just short.”

He picked a perfect time Saturday to change that narrative.

Elwood turned on the first pitch he saw with one out in the top of the eighth for a solo homer to left, his second of the season, “second of his life” in fact.

Aurora Christian held on to beat Yorkville Christian 9-8 in a wild Class 1A Hinckley-Big Rock regional final.

The Eagles (20-14), which advanced to Wednesday’s sectional semifinal at Harvest Christian against the host Lions, let a 5-0 lead slip away. They surged ahead 8-6, then watched as Yorkville Christian (16-12) tied it 8-8 with two out in the bottom of the seventh on Ben Raddatz’s two-run bloop single. That, after the Eagles thought they had won it on an infielder liner ruled trapped.

But Aurora Christian ultimately emerged with the program’s 10th regional title since 2009.

“The fortunate thing is we’ve had those situations before,” Aurora Christian coach Andy Zorger said. “It’s not like they’ve never dealt with them, albeit not on this stage with this pressure. But we have talked about overcoming adversity and battling through the final out. I think that’s started to click.”

Elwood found himself in the middle of Aurora Christian’s scoring rallies all day, and came through each time.

He singled in the first to score Noah Hensley, who doubled twice and reached base three times. Elwood bounced a two-run single to cap off the Eagles’ three-run fourth for a 5-0 lead, then singled in Hensley in the bottom of the sixth to tie it 6-6.

How did Elwood keep coming through? He kept his perspective.

“At the end of the day, in the grand scheme of things, those situations are not a big deal. It’s a children’s game, we’re here to play, here to have fun,” Elwood said. “I try not to let the moment get too big for me.”

Zorger wasn’t surprised to see his senior mainstays Elwood and third pitcher Jack Burns, who threw a scoreless eighth to close it out, come through.

“Those are two seniors that have played all year. You hope that they get those opportunities and they came through,” Zorger said. “He [Elwood] hit the ball hard all year. We’re always talking about, staying up the middle, right center and of course he pulls the home run. The goal is if you’re staying up the middle if you are ahead you keep it fair, which he did.”

Aurora Christian’s back-and-forth win followed a season pattern, its eighth win in nine games after a stretch of seven losses in eight games.

“We had guys, myself included, doing too much,” Elwood said. “We switched and said if we do the little things in the big moments it will work out.”

Yorkville Christian, playing for its first regional title, stranded the bases loaded twice while Aurora Christian built its 5-0 lead.

But the Mustangs didn’t miss out in a six-run fourth. Nolan Hooper had the big hit in the inning, drilling a three-run double to the gap with two out for a 6-5 lead.

In the seventh, after Aurora Christian opted to intentionally walk Yorkville Christian career hits leader Reese Seng with two outs and runners on first and second, Raddatz hit a flare to short right with two strikes to bring in two and force extra innings.

“We had runners on all day, and we finally executed. They just found a little more grass than we did today in the right spots,” Yorkville Christian coach Sean Bieterman said. “It certainly was a game of swings. It’s a hard one just because of the way our guys battled, and the grit.”

It’s hard to say goodbye to six seniors who put Yorkville Christian baseball on the map in the program’s fifth year. Seng had three hits and reached base four times, starting pitcher Danny Paige had two hits and ace pitcher Hooper came up with the big hit.

“We’re a new program, five years in existence. I think we’ve set that we’re going to be a force to deal with for a while,” Bieterman said. “These seniors set the trend for that. I told the younger guys this is the expectation now.”