EDWARDSVILLE – No matter what the situation is, good baseball teams will find ways to win.
Edwardsville did just that against DeSmet Thursday afternoon at Tom Pile Field.
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The Tigers managed to get out of a seventh-inning jam that found themselves facing Spartan runners at first and second and no one out in a tied game; Issac Garrett struck out Nate Martens for the first out and after Zach Hilboldt sacrificed Stephen Randazzo over to second, Garrett got Alex Huber to ground out to second to end the inning.
Edwardsville then opened the bottom of the seventh with a Dylan Burris triple and, after a Kade Burns single and Joel Quirin was intentionally walked to load the bases, Drake Westcott found a hole in the infield and singled home Burris to give the Tigers a 4-3 win over the Spartans to go to 4-0 on the year; DeSmet fell to 1-1.
“Issac does a good job of keeping his composure,” Tiger coach Tim Funkhouser said of Garrett's seventh-inning composure that helped him get out of the jam. “You never see his pulse rise during the course or even dip from the standpoint of getting down; he's so steady, he really competes and he's got good stuff.
“It didn't start the way he wanted, but sure enough, he did a great job – especially as a lefty – of fielding (the Hilboldt bunt). It was a safety squeeze and the runner at third didn't break – he did a good job of checking him a little bit and still throwing it over there (to first). It was an outstanding play and really the play of the game.”
“This was a battle today for sure,” Burris said. “It doesn't matter how you get there – it matters the score at the end of the game and who wins it; today, we came out on top. That's what it's all about.”
The Spartans had a couple of opportunities to break the game open when they held a 3-2 lead in the fifth, but Edwardsville found ways to keep the game close when they needed to. “We got into some trouble in the seventh inning, but we came through at the end there and made out plays when we needed to make them and got the job done.”
The Tigers got out to a lead early when Burris walked to start the game, stole second, advanced to third on a Kade Burns flyout to right and came home on a Joel Quirin sacrifice fly to center to get to a 1-0 lead; in the second, Edwardsville scored again when Andrew Yancik homered to left-center to open the second, putting EHS up 2-0. The Spartans scored twice in the third when Martens doubled home a pair of runs to tie it up at 2-2, then took the lead in the sixth when they got the bases loaded and Hilbodt hit a sacrifice fly to left that scored Katom Parnell, enabling the Spartans to grab a 3-2 lead.
Edwardsville tied it in the sixth when Reid Hendrickson reached on an error, going to second in the process; Hendrickson then scored when Yancik doubled to bring Hendrickson in to forge a 3-3 tie, leading to the seventh-inning heroics rom Garrett and Westcott.
“The infield was in and the outfield was in,” Westcott said. “Coach told me to hit something hard to the outfield or get to the infield,” and Westcott did, finding a hole in the left side of the infield and got the ball between the shortstop and third baseman to bring in Burris with the winning run.
“I’m getting satisfied,” Westcott, a freshman, said of his adjustment to hitting at the high school level. “I'm getting more comfortable, seeing more pitches and getting better at-bats.
“Issac made great pitches; he got the guy on the bunt and got out of the inning; we had momentum coming in. We were like, 'we're going to win it' and Dylan hit the triple – that was it from there.”
Yancik went 3-for-3 with the homer, two RBIs and a run scored for EHS; Burris was 1-for-3 with the triple and two runs scored, Westcott was 1-for-3 with the game-winning RBI, Will Messer 1-for-2 and Hendrickson had a run scored. J.T. Mabry went 2-for-3 with a run scored, Randazzo 2-for-4 with a run scored, T.J. Burke 1-for-3, Martens 1-for-3 with a double and two RBIs and Parnell 1-for-3 with a run scored.
Garrett got the win, throwing the seventh, with Andrew Frank and Yancik throwing three innings each, Frank striking out two and Yancik five; Martens took the loss, throwing two-thirds of an inning.
The Tigers host Moline at 4:30 p.m. Monday, then open Southwestern Conference play against Collinsville at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday at Arthur Fletcher Field in Collinsville.
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