Baseball: Wheaton North squeaks by Batavia
Aaron Holland and Will Fletcher have a bit of their "own language" as a catcher and pitcher combination.
Holland and Fletcher, Wheaton North seniors, can trace their baseball relationship back to 13-U travel baseball.
"All I have to say is one thing and he knows to fix the adjustment," Holland said following the Falcons' 4-3 series-opening win over Batavia on Monday. "He trusts me, too, that's a big thing. These pitchers to trust me is huge."
Fletcher, in five innings, had five strikeouts and slogged through a three-run fourth inning blitz from the Bulldogs. But the Falcons offense and two shutout innings from Quinn Flanagan took care of the rest.
"That's one of my boys," Holland said of Fletcher. "We hype each other up; I just love his mentality up there ... big thing is confidence and attitude. He goes on the bench and he's not goofing around with the guys. He goes and sits down and he's quiet, locked in."
"That's what I love about [him] as a pitcher: He's locked-in, he listens," Holland said. "We have feedback. Every once in a while, quick things."
The Falcons (5-4, 1-0) struck first in the fourth inning on an RBI groundout from first baseman Joe Logan, but Batavia (2-4-1, 0-1) roared back with a three-spot of its own in the bottom half of the inning.
Fletcher walked Austin Winslow and Charlie Saul and Anthony Johnson followed with singles to load the bases. A wild pitch allowed Winslow to motor home to tie it at 1-1. After Fletcher rebounded with a strikeout, Kevin Niedzwiedz smacked a two-run double for the 3-1 Bulldogs lead.
In the fifth inning, after a pair of singles from Casey Morrison and Matthew Buehler, Ty O'Connell tied it on his two-run double. Holland then hit the go-ahead RBI double for the 4-3 Falcons lead, where it would remain.
Batavia junior Joe Kleist battled for a complete game and five-strikeout performance, but the Bulldogs bats mustered just two singles after their fourth inning explosion the rest of the way.
"I thought [Fletcher] did a real nice job bouncing back in the fifth [allowing just one single and coaxing three pouts]," Falcons coach Dan Schoessling said. "After they scored those three, that was a huge inning for us to just kind of settle down and catch our breath. Quinn coming in was big [in relief]."
"That was a good high school baseball game," Batavia coach Alex Beckmann said. "For the most part, pretty clean. [The Falcons] squared up a couple balls and did a really good job there in that fifth inning bouncing back after we got them for a couple, but Joe was awesome today."
Kleist's complete game effort allowed Batavia to save its bullpen for the remainder of the series.
"[Kleist] has kind of emerged as our No. 1 [pitcher]," Beckmann said. "We had some guys go down with injuries and stuff like that. [Kleist] has stepped up and he has a good demeanor out there and just calm; pounds the zone and we played, for the most part, pretty good defense for him."