Baseball: Schaumburg tops Glenbard West to reach regional final
Schaumburg never blinked.
The Saxons shrugged off an early deficit and then cruised past Glenbard West 8-2 in the opening round of the Class 4A baseball playoffs Thursday in Schaumburg.
The eighth-seeded Saxons (16-11) will play at top-seeded Lake Park Monday. Lake Park eliminated Hoffman Estates 5-3 on Thursday.
"We came in with a plan to be disciplined." Schaumburg coach Nick Kostalek said. "We wanted see pitches and not give in. Our guys committed to the plan and got them on and hit them over."
Kostalek had confidence in his offense, even when his team fell behind.
"We knew were going to be able to score some runs," Kostalek said. "The wind was blowing out and the ball carries well here. We knew if we could put it in play, we would be ok."
Schaumburg fell behind 2-0 in the top of the first. Danny Mulcare had a two-out single and scored on Billy Frantzis' double for the Hilltoppers. Frantzis then scored on Cody Paul's single to left.
It was all Schaumburg after that.
It began with the Saxons' first batter, Kevin Schoefernacker, who tripled to deep right-center. He scored on Justin Gadomski's double. Gadomski would later score on a wild pitch and Nathan Collier, who had his second consecutive 3-hit game, would single and later score on Joseph Stagowski's sacrifice fly to make it 3-2.
That was all the runs Zachary Slome (8-4) would need. The senior would pitch 5 scoreless inning from there, allowing just two baserunners.
"I got my command back and got my pitches over," said Slome, who would strike out 8 and not walk a batter. "I was hitting my spots and my curveball looked good. I was getting it over the plate and they weren't hitting the ball hard."
Schaumburg added on in the next two innings to put the game away.
The Saxons loaded the bases with one out in the second. Collier had an RBI single scoring Schoefernacker, who was hit by a pitch. Ryan Phillips also was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded, scoring Gadomski, and it was 5-2.
"I just loved going after it," Collier said. "We like to play with a chip on our shoulder and it really helps when everyone is loud in the dugout."
Gadomski broke the game open in the third with a 2-run triple scoring Joesph Masi and Schoefernacker. Gadomski then scored on Armen Torosian's suicide squeeze that made it 8-2.
"We just tried to keep each other up in the dugout when we fell behind," said Gadomski, who also pitched a scoreless seventh inning. "We knew it was going to be a long ballgame. We got all game to score. I was really confident up there today."
Chase Krueger came on in the third and pitched well for Glenbard West (12-17), striking out 8, including 7 in a row. But the Hilltoppers, who lost their final four games of the season, couldn't get any offense going.
"We felt good after the top of the first," Glenbard West coach Andy Schultz. "Give credit to them. They got punched in the gut and came right back swinging. We felt good with our plan, we just didn't execute as well as we could."