Naperville C. bats leave no doubt about result

Naperville Central's hoping it saved some for Saturday.

The Redhawks' baseball team rolled into the Class 4A Naperville Central regional title game by blasting Hinsdale Central 14-5 on Wednesday.

The Lockport sectional's seventh seed advances to Saturday's title game to play today's semifinal winner between No. 2 Naperville North and No. 18 Lincoln-Way Central.

Naperville Central's 7-run fifth inning broke open a game that looked to be controlled by the 10th-seeded Red Devils (16-14), who led 4-1 in the third inning. Using only 2 hits, the Redhawks (21-14) took advantage of two hit batters and two huge errors while sending 10 men to the plate.

Everyone in the lineup reached base for the Redhawks in the fifth. Matt Cmiel had an RBI single, Nick Schlund drew a bases-loaded walk and Matt Soria was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded. Three runs scored on an infield error.

"I did think if we put some pressure on them, maybe we could create some opportunities for ourselves, and I think that's what we did," said Redhawks coach Bill Seiple. "They're very dangerous offensively and you don't want to get in a tournament where you have outslug anybody. But we thought if we could put some pressure on them we might have a chance."

Redhawks starter Pat Kaminska (5-2) struggled early but recovered to pitch an impressive complete game. He allowed 5 earned runs, but he also struck out nine and allowed only 2 hits and no walks in the final four innings.

"The first couple of innings I just came out sluggish and was kind of going through the motions," Kaminska said. "I was mad at myself because I'm always telling the other guys to play this game like it's the last game of the year. In the fourth inning I started working faster and it fell into place."

After Nick Linne's solo home run for the Redhawks in the first inning, Hinsdale Central's Charlie Herr gave his team a 3-1 lead with a 3-run homer. Josh Camalick put the Red Devils ahead 4-1 with a third-inning RBI double.

Ben Lucas launched a 3-run game-tying homer in bottom of the third and Marc Mantucca added an RBI double to give the Redhawks a 5-4 lead.

Naperville Central's explosion put the lead at 12-4 before the Red Devils' David Kiyosaki doubled home a run in the sixth inning to narrow the gap to 12-5. The margin grew to 14-5 when Kaminska and Wesley Webb had RBI singles.

"All year long we've played pretty solid defense but we just gave them too many runs," said Hinsdale Central coach Tom Dorrance. "You can't give a good team like that too many opportunities."