Baseball: Batavia comes back to beat St. Charles East
Things didn't exactly go as planned in the early going Friday afternoon for Batavia's baseball team.
Three batters into the game, the Bulldogs found themselves trailing St. Charles East 2-0 after John Dellostritto's leadoff double, Clay Conn's double that was lost in the sun in right field, and Pat Griffin's 2-run single.
The Saints' lead stretched to 3-0 following freshman Kyle Hayes' RBI double.
"We didn't panic after the first inning," said Batavia coach Alex Beckmann, who watched his team score 7 runs over the fifth and sixth innings to rally past the Saints 8-3 in Upstate Eight Conference River Division action in Batavia.
"We could've shut down and it could've gotten ugly quick but we kept grinding out at-bats, getting guys on and making them pay for some mistakes. That's kind of what we do."
Batavia (9-3, 6-1) narrowed the gap to 3-1 with an unearned run in the second on Joseph Sartain's RBI single before tying the game at 3-3 with a pair of fifth-inning runs.
Brad Niedzwiedz began the rally with a 1-out infield single before Jared Martin walked and a wild pitch advanced the runners to second and third.
Junior catcher Carter Gette then fisted a 1-1 pitch into shallow left field for a game-tying 2-run single.
"That was kind of a duck snort," said Gette. "I got jammed a little bit but just muscled it into left field."
Line drive or bloop - it was a welcome sight for the Bulldogs.
"That was a great job of putting the ball in play and a great job by Martin of reading that ball at second base and scoring on a ball that barely gets to the outfield," said Beckmann.
Batavia snapped a 3-3 deadlock with a 5-run sixth that featured a pair of walks, a hit batsman, 2 wild pitches, a balk, an error and 2-run singles from Martin and Cole Nelson.
"We were able to get into their bullpen a little bit there," said Beckmann. "In a three-game series, that's always a big key, especially with all of the games we have piling up every day here."
Senior right-hander Drew Conn enjoyed a quality start for the Saints (5-5-1, 3-1), working the first 5 innings, allowing 2 earned runs on 5 hits with 4 strikeouts.
"I thought Drew threw very well," said Saints coach Len Asquini. "You could tell he was getting a little fatigued toward the end and we were trying to get him through (the fifth). We just didn't hold after that."
Sophomore Drew Iutzwig recorded the victory for the Bulldogs, allowing 3 runs on 7 hits through 5 innings before junior Jack Meyers worked a pair of scoreless innings in relief.
Neither pitched issued a walk.
"When we don't walk guys generally it's a good result," said Beckmann. "That's been true so far this year."
The series resumes at 1 p.m. Saturday in St. Charles.
"I wish our offense would've been a little more aggressive throughout the game," said Asquini. "We kind of went to sleep after that first inning."