Edwardsville's summer baseball season is definitely ending up on a high note.
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The Tigers got an outstanding pitching performance from Tyler Hosto Saturday night as Hosto gave up just three hits, walked one and retired 13 batters in a row at one point in a 4-1 win over the St. Louis Pirates to wrap up pool play in the DSP Midwest Classic at the Tigers' JV field.
Combined with wins over Mizuno Braves Red and Team Missouri Friday evening, Saturday's win gave Edwardsville a perfect 4-0 record in the preliminaries and sent them to a semifinal game that was set for late Sunday morning at Tom Pile Field against the Quakes.
“Tyler started in a game last Saturday morning (in a tournament in Bloomington-Normal), but we only got one inning in before it started raining,” said Tiger coach Tim Funkhouser. “We picked up a game Monday against the Quakes (which Edwardsville won) and were able to have him throw four innings and get some work in going into tonight.
“He had some good movement on his fastball and and got some good plays from the defense. There were a few things I thought we should have taken advantage of a couple of times – we left the bases loaded a couple of times – but we battled well at the plate.”
Hosto saw mostly time in relief during the high school season, so getting the ball to start a game was a different situation for him. “I was struggling a bit at times, and it was tough,” Hosto said, “but I got into a zone in the second inning and things went well.”
The fact that the Tigers' summer season will be ending just when the team is hitting its stride, while a bit disappointing, also is giving Hosto something to look forward to. “We're ending on a good note,” Hosto said. “We all feel we're playing much better baseball and it'd be good to end this summer on a high note. I'm planning on hitting the weights hard and work on my mechanics during the winter.”
Edwardsville jumped out to a quick lead in the first when Andrew Yancik got a one-out walk and Joel Quirin doubled him home for the Tigers' first run. Joe Wallace then singled before a series of walks and errors brought in two more runs to put Edwardsville up 3-0. The Pirates countered with a run in the second when Jordan Richardson doubled and went to third on a Nick Yates single. Yates was thrown out trying to steal, but Richardson scored when Donovan Psarsis grounded to first. Kyle Johnson then walked but was picked off to end the inning.
The Tigers' only other run came in the fourth when Daniel Reed singled and went to third on a wild pitch when the catcher couldn't find the ball. Nathan French then walked and both advanced on another wild pitch, Reed scoring on the play.
Hosto settled down after the second, retiring 13 batters in a row from the third to the seventh before Hayden Schaefer doubled, but Hosto got Keegan Backsmeyer to ground to third and Kevin Graham to line to second to end the game.
In Friday's wins, Edwardsville downed Mizuno Braves Red 10-1 and Team Missouri 5-3, both games at Tom Pile Field. Tyler Stamer had a home run for Edwardsville in the Mizuno game, while Cole Cimarolli and Quirin each tripled and Cole Hansel had three doubles. Jordan Yenne went five innings for the win against Mizuno, while Tyler Lewis went five innings in the win over Team Missouri.
The Tigers went to 15-8 on the summer with the win.
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