Softball: West Aurora storms back against Bartlett
Gabi Nilles was looking strictly for location in the bottom of the fifth inning Thursday afternoon in Aurora.
The West Aurora junior delivered in key fashion, pulling a two-out hard single to right field to score Shai Erdrich and Mackenzie Pierce to break a slugfest tie with Bartlett in an Upstate Eight Conference softball game.
Nilles' sharp grounder provided the Blackhawks with their only lead of the game as Gab Drager pitched the final five innings in relief to earn a 13-11 victory.
Drager also starred at the plate, going 4-for-4 as both teams finished the league contest with 15 hits apiece.
"Pull is my strong side," said Nilles, a left-handed batter. "I was just waiting until she gave me the pitch I wanted. I went up there knowing I was looking for a low, middle-in pitch. I go up there confident hitting down in the count."
It was a difficult loss for Bartlett (1-11, 1-2) to stomach.
The Hawks sent 19 batters to the plate in the first two innings alone.
But their 10-2 lead after the top of the second was a distant memory as Drager allowed a mere unearned run in her five-inning stint for West Aurora (7-5, 3-0).
"Right now we're struggling to close out games," Bartlett coach Jim Wolfsmith said. "This is the third or fourth game that we have been ahead. We were hitting."
The Hawks had 10 runs on an equal number of hits against West Aurora starter Eternity Gonzales, who was coming off a perfect game against Glenbard East.
Lizzie Jacoby, Charlotte Linnartz, Riley Scrivner, Erika Rosberg and Nicole Young all had extra-base hits for Bartlett during its early onslaught.
Young capped the Hawks' seven-run second with a triple down into the right-center gap that scored Rosberg and Emily Baggot.
"It's been a struggle lately hitting-wise, so it was nice to put the ball in play," Young said. "It felt good to have a lead over the other team. We played a lot better today; our energy was up a lot more."
But West Aurora would strike back with a vengeance in its half of the third.
Sara Archer had a run-scoring double in the second to whet the Blackhawks' batting appetite.
The Blackhawks erupted for 7 runs in the third.
Riley Mont, Nilles and Archer had a double and back-to-back singles in a three-batter sequence to score 4 of the runs.
West Aurora eventually tied the game at 10-10 in its third at-bat when the Hawks' catcher missed home plate on a bases-loaded comebacker to her batterymate.
"After 10-2, just win the innings," West Aurora coach Randy Hayslett said of his message. "I knew we had a chance when we cut it to 10-5, 10-6. Gab did a great job coming in. We made a few errors, kicking the ball around. That was uncharacteristic."