Walker's arm, bat lift Marian past Rockets

Marian Catholic's Matt Santchi is congratulated by teammates after scoring a run against Rich East.
(Jason Han/SouthtownStar)

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Marian Catholic is searching for offense early in the season, but with Joey Walker on the mound Thursday, the Spartans didn’t need much.

Walker tossed five shutout innings and had the game’s biggest hit as Marian Catholic topped Rich East 4-2 in a nonconference game in Chicago Heights.

“Joey came out throwing strikes and gave us a chance to get an early lead,” Marian Catholic coach Phil Wail said. “We had some momentum after our first win (Wednesday against Bishop McNamara) and we were able to build on that.”

Walker also came through with his bat in the bottom of the first. After Matt Santschi’s leadoff walk, Walker doubled into the left-center gap to move Santschi to third.

Mac Stevenson (1-for-2, RBI, run) drove Santschi home with a sacrifice fly. Walker moved to third on the play and scored on a wild pitch as Marian (2-2) jumped out to a 2-0 lead.

“The double was kind of a momentum builder,” Walker said. “It gave us the early lead and kind of rattled Rich East a bit. We’re a young team and we’ve been struggling on offense, but we’re going to come around.”

Rich East ace Marcus Cruz, meanwhile, did all he could to keep the Rockets (1-3-1) in the game. Cruz allowed three runs (two earned) in four innings. He struck out eight, including four in the second inning, when Nick Kaczmarczyk reached on a dropped third strike.

Walker was a bit better, allowing just three hits and two walks. Rich East did not get a runner to second base until Peter Doerr doubled with two outs in the top of the fifth.

Jason Mesick was gunned out at the plate on the play, ending the inning and the Rockets’ only threat against Walker.

“It was my first time on the mound this season and I was just trying to throw strikes,” Walker said. “I didn’t hit all my spots, but I got ahead of hitters and was good enough.”

Marian tacked on a run in the top of the fourth when Santschi singled and wreaked havoc on the basepaths. The Spartans leadoff man stole second and advanced to third when the throw went awry. He ended up scoring on a wild pitch.

The Spartans stole three bases and were aggressive on the basepaths all day.

“As the weather warms up, hopefully, we’ll get the bats going,” Wail said. “Right now, we have to find a way to score. We have a lot of speed and we’re trying to take advantage of it.”

Stevenson doubled and scored on Joe Swanson’s groundout in the fifth for a 4-0 lead.

Rich East got on the board in the seventh. Eric Otterson singled, and Sean Goggins doubled. Both scored on wild pitches. Pat Healy finished things off on the mound for Marian.

“(Cruz) has pitched in four games for us and those are the first earned runs he’s allowed,” Rich East coach Brad Wieher said. “He’s definitely been a bright spot with his pitching and his offense. We’ve been able to play with teams. We just need to start making the plays to win games.”