Baseball: Lake Zurich’s Toth blasts walk-off homer to beat St. Viator

Alex Toth helped Lake Zurich exorcize some demons Thursday.

The junior drilled a 2-0 fastball for a two-run walk-off home run as the Bears upended St. Viator 7-6 in Lake Zurich.

“I was sitting fastball and I got what I wanted and drove it,” said Toth, who belted his third homer of the season. “As soon as I hit it, I knew.”

The win ended a four-game losing streak for Lake Zurich (8-6). It also helped the Bears erase the memory of a 19-2 drubbing at the hands of Lake Forest on Tuesday.

“This helps flip the switch a lot,” Toth said. “We had a team meeting after Tuesday and we talked about things. And it’s happening. Practice has been better and hopefully we keep building from here.”

Lale Zurich coach Derek Parola, who is in his first year as head coach, said he was pleased with how his team turned things around.

“Baseball is a funny game,” Parola said. “I think Tuesday night for these guys felt that the world was crashing down and they would never win another game. They kind of flushed it on Wednesday and we had a great practice. It was nice to be on our home field and to be able to play well.”

Lake Zurich appeared to be Iine to win the game earlier. The Bears scored two runs in the bottom of the sixth to break a 3-3 tie.

Blake Zabet had an RBI double, scoring Ben Michels, who was running for Reid Pfeifer, who had led the inning off with a single. Zabet then scored thanks to a single by Lucas Hovinen that culminated with a sweet head-first slide at home by Zabet to make it 5-3.

But St. Viator (12-5) was no stranger to comebacks. The Lions rallied from seven runs down to Fremd on Tuesday to earn a 10-10 tie.

Alec Harer walked to lead off the top of the seventh. Tanner Beyna singled with his second hit of the game. Jonathan Tschanz followed with a fielder’s choice and his courtesy runner Colin Smith promptly stole second.

Brandon Thomsen, who hit a pair of three-run homers in the Lions’ comeback on Tuesday, drilled his third hit of the day. That scored Harer, and Smith was able to score on an error to tie the game. Tommy Beyna followed with his third hit and drove in his fourth run to put the Lions up 6-5.

Undaunted, Colin Chung drilled a 3-2 pitch for a single to lead off the bottom of the seventh for Lake Zurich.

“I was super confident when I came up there,” said Chung, who hit a solo homer in the first inning to give Lake Zurich a 1-0 lead.

“I started out the season slow, but the last three or four games I have been squaring up the ball well. So I had a lot of confidence going up there and I knew I could do some damage.”

Chung was at first base for two pitches when Toth brought him home.

“We kind of hit a rough spot as a team,” Chung said. “But we got together as a team and really looked at the issues we had. And I think today really showed how much that made a difference.”

St. Viator coach Terry Beyna said he was pleased how his team battled back.

“We just don’t quit,” Beyna said. “We are always coming back. I am really proud of this group. We just keep plugging away, even when it looks like it could be easy to quit.”