Baseball: Geneva’s best season ever ends in supersectionals

Geneva’s record-breaking baseball season ended Monday night following its 8-1 Class 3A supersectional loss to East Peoria at Black Hawk College in Moline.

The game, originally scheduled at Geneseo High School, moved to the all-turf field at Black Hawk College due to rainfall earlier in the day.

East Peoria (27-13), which advances to Friday’s 10 a.m. 3A state semifinals against St. Rita (28-12) at Joliet’s Slammers Stadium, grabbed an early lead with a pair of runs in the top of the first off Vikings junior starter Mason Bruesch.

Back-to-back singles from Jackson Ahrens and Breyon Maroney, and a walk to RJ Duncheon loaded the bases for cleanup hitter Auggie Lohnes, who delivered a 2-run single to give the Raiders a 2-0 lead.

Geneva (32-8) answered with a run of its own in the bottom half of the frame.

Nick Torrence smacked a 1-out double before junior catcher Alex Abraham’s RBI single to right cut the deficit to 2-1.

The Raiders seized control with a 3-run third. Eli Martin tripled and scored on a wild pitch to make it 3-1.

After Roman Moody’s RBI triple, Maroney (3 for 5) singled to left, sending Moody across with East Peoria’s fifth run.

Senior pitcher Dalton Oakman did the rest for the Raiders, throwing 6 1/3 innings of 1-run, 4-hit ball with a walk and 2 strikeouts.

Oakman escaped several possible early jams, inducing double plays in each of the first three innings.

“Their pitcher did a nice job,” said Vikings coach Brad Wendell. “We hit some balls at guys, but he got us to beat some balls in the ground and pop up.”

Martin (2 for 5) padded the lead with a 2-run single in the fifth, while Ahrens (3 for 5) capped the scoring with an RBI single in the sixth.

Geneva pitchers Bruesch, AJ Minderman, and Matthew Martija combined for 10 strikeouts.

Aidan Hall and Tate Beran added base hits for the Vikings, who were held to 1 run for the first time since their season-opening, 4-0 loss to Yorkville in March.

“It hurts,” said Wendell. “All of the guys put in a lot of work to get us to this point. We had a great practice on Sunday. It’s hard to see it end. I’m sad that it’s over.”

Geneva, which captured its first sectional championship and earned its first conference (DuKane) title in 19 years, will lose 10 seniors — Blake Kopec, Josh Frieders, Jack Price, Ryan Kastor, Tommy Lyons, Dylan Anderson, Oscar Colburn, Mason Steurer, Torrence, and Hall.

“It’s a tough way for the seniors to go out, but we just experienced the best season in Geneva history and those guys were very much responsible for that,” Wendell said. “They set a new standard for Geneva baseball.”

The Vikings will return plenty of talent, headed by staff ace Noah Hallahan, Nelson Wendell, Gavin Dworak, Nick Lozano, Beran, Bruesch, Abraham, Minderman, and Martija.

“A lot of our younger guys now have two years under their belts,” said the coach. “They have invaluable experience that you can’t teach. Hopefully, they’ll remember what they did to get there, but it’ll be a new team and new season (in 2027).

“We’ll have a lot of guys back and a lot of arms back.”