As far as wins go, this one was pretty efficient.
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How efficient?
Marquette's Max Goepel needed just 79 pitches in an hour and 26 minutes to send the Explorers into the semifinals of the IHSA Class 3A Jersey Regional Monday in a 2-0 win over Triad at Lloyd Hopkins Field.
That's efficient.
“Max did a great job,” said Explorer coach Tim Fahnestock. “We've been hitting on all cylinders lately and to be able to win a regional game for the first time in a couple of years, it feels great.
“It was a good win; I'm really happy about it.”
While Goepel had some good pitches that kept the Knights at bay, he credited his defense, who came up with some good plays when he needed it. “They were making some plays behind me,” Goepel said. “My fastball was working pretty well today too. We've been playing better as a team overall lately.”
Both of the Explorers' runs came off the bat of third baseman Jacob Eggering, who hit a sacrifice fly in the first to bring in shortstop Zack Weinman, then singled in Weinman in the third after Weinman walked and stole second with two out in the inning.
“We were making plays today and I knew I needed to be aggressive at the plate,” Weinman said. “We knew we needed to get ahead of them pretty early and that's what we did.”
The win put the Explorers into Wednesday's semifinal game against the host Panthers, which will be played at 4 p.m.; the other semifinal between Highland and Civic Memorial will follow, with the final set for 11 a.m. Saturday. The regional winner moves into next week's Salem Sectional, where they will face the Freeburg Regional champion.
The regional is expected to be a wide-open one; any of the teams are thought to have a shot at advancing. Fahenstock is looking forward to the challenge.
“It's going to be a good one,” Fahenstock said. “If the kids play as well as they can, we'll be in it. We'll need to be ready and grind it out if we have to, but there's going to be some really good baseball played this week.”
