Moline shuts door on Benet's title hopes
EAST PEORIA — Benet's rally swung the door open to the state championship game, but it was a brief glimpse.
Jordan de los Reyes slammed it shut with one swing.
De los Reyes answered Benet's tying sixth-inning runs with a 2-run homer in the top of the seventh, and Moline advanced to the Class 4A state championship game with a 5-3 win on Friday at EastSide Centre.
“There's a reason we walked her at the beginning of the game,” Benet's Mikayla Panko said, “and that's exactly why — because she can do things like that.”
The score tied 3-3, Moline's Lindsey Nelson reached on an error to lead off the top of the seventh. No. 3 hitter de los Reyes, walked in the fifth with two runners on base, worked the count to 2-0, then crushed a no-doubter deep over the fence in center.
“She hadn't thrown the ball down the middle against me all night,” said de los Reyes, who had 5 homers coming in. “She did there, and I took advantage of it.”
Five-time champion Moline (27-8-1) advances to today's 7 p.m. championship, where it will play St. Charles North. The North Stars beat New Trier 2-1 on an Annie Korth walkoff homer. Moline was third in 4A last year.
Benet (30-11) trailing for the first time these playoffs, didn't quit in its first state finals appearance.
Down 3-1, Redwings senior Shellie Schaffer walked with two outs in the sixth. Panko jarred herself with a foul tip off her mask, then lined a single to center.
Freshman sister Marissa Panko, who had the game-winning hit in Monday's supersectional, blooped a hit the opposite way, and when the ball kicked by the left fielder, courtesy runner Tracy Griffin scored and runners moved to second and third.
Ali Michalik followed with a pop-up between the mound and first, but the ball miraculously dropped in between three infielders, Mikayla Panko coming home with the tying run.
“I thought we were going to make it happen,” Marissa Panko said.
With go-ahead runs on second and third, though, Moline's Jordan Kasbohm came back to strike out hot-hitting Benet leadoff hitter Maeve McGuire. McGuire, 8-for-10 over her last three playoff games, went hitless Friday with a first-inning walk.
“How can I not want that situation? I got our best hitter up there,” Benet coach Jerry Schilf said. “I felt very comfortable that Maeve was going to come through for us. It just didn't happen.”
A win within their grasp eluded the Redwings, but Schilf could hardly fault his kids' fight.
“My kids played hard,” Schilf said. “Moline's just a solid team. One through nine they have hitters, and we do too. Maybe they have a little more experience than we do here, but I think my kids definitely showed that they deserved to be here.”
Benet struck first, in the second inning. Julianne Rurka slashed a full-count single to right, was sacrificed to second and scored on fellow freshman Panko's full-count double over the left fielder.
Moline, making its 13th state tournament appearance, answered with 2 runs in the third and 1 in the fifth. Nelson singled in the Maroons' first run, and her perfectly executed suicide squeeze scored Hayley Marlier to make it 3-1.
Rurka singled twice for Benet, which plays New Trier at 4:30 p.m. today for third place.
“Only two 4A teams in the season end their season with a win,” Mikayla Panko said. “We're gonna be one of them.”