Storck pitches Kaneland past Marmion
Good thing for Kaneland pitcher Trevor Storck that it's a lot more important to finish well than get off to a good start.
Because the first three batters Storck faced Saturday morning against Marmion could not have gone much worse.
On his first pitch of the game Storck hit A.J. Friedman in the back. He followed by walking Mitch Sterne and Kyle Kozak as the Cadets loaded the bases with nobody out without taking the bat off their shoulder.
Just as quickly as Storck got himself into a jam he worked his way out of it. Storck allowed just one run in that first inning, then one more in the next five innings to pitch Kaneland to a 7-2 victory over Marmion in a rematch of last year's Class 3A Rochelle sectional championship game.
“It was a shaky start but with our defense I'm always confident out there pitching,” said Storck, who allowed 3 hits, 2 runs and 3 walks while striking out three and throwing 55 of his 92 pitches for strikes.
“If I get the ball over the plate they are going to make plays for me. We have an unbelievable outfield. They are going to go get everything. My job is just to throw strikes. After I got settled down I did all right at that.”
Marmion (1-2) managed just 5 hits in the game. The Cadets tried to mount a comeback in the seventh with singles by RJ Gibson and Sterne to load the bases before reliever Bryan Van Bogaert induced a grounder that charging shortstop Trever Heinle fielded for the final out.
The Cadets scored their only other run in the fourth when Marmion starting pitcher Chris Simon drew a bases-loaded walk. But the inning could have been much worse for Kaneland if not for center fielder Ray Barry snagging a line drive and doubling a Marmion runner off second base to end the inning.
“That was huge Ray getting the double play and getting out of the inning, that got me going,” Storck said. “That gave us some momentum to come in and then we started hitting.”
Kaneland (2-1) didn't get much going early against Simon, now a hard-luck 0-2 without getting much support against the Knights or Lincoln-Way Central. Quinn Buschbacher, who made a diving catch in left field to take a hit away from Simon in the second, led off the fourth with a single.
An error on a possible double play grounder was the opening Kaneland needed. Tom Fox followed with an RBI single, then heads-up baserunning and good situational hitting allowed two more runs to score on a groundout by Jordan Jones and a sacrifice fly by John Hopkins for a 3-2 Kaneland lead.
“We played some good offensive baseball, got guys on, moved them over, took the extra base, put some pressure on them defensively,” Kaneland coach Brian Aversa said.
The Knights broke the game open with four runs in the fifth. They again ran the bases well, Marmion committed 2 more errors and Buschbacher's RBI single, a run-scoring ground out by Fox and Jones' timely two-out, two-run line single to right brought in the runs for a 7-2 lead.
Marmion made four errors and no hitter in the lineup had more than one hit.
“Bottom line is you make errors and have a bad approach at the plate against a good team they are going to beat you,” Marmion coach Dave Rakow said. “We did that today. On a good day we are pretty evenly matched with them but good teams beat you when you make mistakes and I give Kaneland credit, they came out and played well today.”
Barry and Buschbacher both had 2 hits for the Knights.