Tigers' Klett does job on mound, at plate

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For 4 1/3 innings, Plainfield North senior left-hander Mike Klett put on a show for a couple of college coaches sitting in the bleachers watching him do his thing.

Then, when his pitch count reached 90, he was relieved of his duties on the mound. He spent the second half of North’s 10-6 victory over Morris on Wednesday afternoon showing off his all-around athleticism.

He played left field, center field and right field. He also connected for two hits in three at-bats, one of them a triple. He stole a base and scored two runs.

The Tigers (9-3, 6-0) needed those runs to remain undefeated in Southwest Prairie Conference play. They built leads of 6-0 and 8-1 and then withstood a late charge by the Redskins as the game went from a pitcher’s duel to a free-for-all.

Klett (5-0) took a no-hitter into the fourth. And he needed to be on top of his game with another Division I prospect matching him nearly pitch-for-pitch in the early innings.

Morris starter Kevin Henry (2-1), who is being recruited as a football lineman by Indiana, was nicked for only one hit in the first three innings, a one-out single by North’s Tim Eulitz in the third.

The tide turned in the top of the fourth when Henry struggled to maintain his control and the Morris defense faltered behind him. North scored three runs without hitting a ball cleanly out of the infield.

Two of the runs scored on an error. Henry walked three and hit one batter in the inning as the Tigers batted around.

“Yeah, in the first three innings, I thought both pitchers did a good job,” Morris coach Todd Kein said. “Neither team was really putting the ball in play hard. It did look like it was going to be a pitchers' duel. But, at the same time, it’s too early there to tell how things are going to play out. The second half of the ballgame certainly had a different feel than the first — that’s true.”

North tacked on three more runs in the fifth and pushed its lead to 6-0. Jeff Paulson’s two-run single was the highlight of the uprising. He finished with two hits in four at-bats, including a double. He drove in four runs. Zach Pacanowski and Andrew Starks also had two hits for the Tigers.

Klett is their ace lefty, leadoff man and offensive ignitor — though at 6-5 he breaks from the prototypical leadoff mold. During the winter months, he played center of the North boys basketball team that went 26-5, won the conference championship and reached the 4A sectional semifinals before losing to Neuqua Valley (69-49).

The Tigers’ extended run in basketball led to him reporting late for baseball. He still is working to catch up with the rest of North’s pitching staff. And he still is working on a tight pitch count.

He used a tailing fastball to challenge Morris’ hitters. And he mixed in a curve that darted in on the hands of right-handed hitters to keep the Redskins from digging in at the plate. He allowed one run on three hits before departing with runners on second and third and one out in the bottom of the fourth. He struck out seven.

Ethan Johnson put out the Morris fire as two or three college coaches took mental notes.

Klett is being wooed by Northern Illinois and Western Michigan. His batterymate — North catcher Zach Pacanowski — also is on Northern’s recruiting radar.

“The fastball was working because the wind was blowing in,” Klett said. “I was just trying to get it over the plate and make them put the bat on the ball. My curve was breaking straight down and it was running in a little bit on the righties, yeah.”

“I thought Mike (Klett) was pitching well,” North coach John Darlington said. “His pitch count got up there a little bit. They got a couple of guys on, and we had the lead. We just didn’t see much reason to push him any further there. Why leave him in? You’ve got to remember Mike is two or three weeks late in starting because of basketball compared to the rest of our guys, who have been throwing.

“We’re still watching pitch counts with him. We had him at about 90 pitches. We had the big lead. We thought that was plenty. Obviously, it wasn’t. We’re happy to win. But I think our mental attitude is we have to be disappointed in the way we ended the game.

“I think it was a sloppy game by both groups. We haven’t played in a week. That takes a toll on you, and we had a test day today. So, hopefully, tomorrow things will be better. And I think it will be.”

The two teams meet in Game 2 of their series at 6 p.m. Thursday at Silver Cross Field.

Morris (5-11, 2-5) was led Kjeld Torkelson and Matt Hussey. Both had two hits. Torkelson doubled and scored two runs. Henry went 1-for-3, including a double, and scored a run. The Redskins pushed across one run in the fifth, two in the sixth and three more in the seventh, taking advantage of three walks to load the bases in the seventh with one out.

Henry was pulled after logging six innings on the mound. He allowed eight runs — five earned — on seven hits. He struck out four.

“Kevin, in that stretch of runs that they did score, he did his job,” Kein said. “He made pitches. We had some defensive opportunities that we didn’t capitalize on, and today just wasn’t our day in those situations.

“To their credit, they took advantage of our mistakes. We weren’t really able to get anything going until the latter part of the game. And, by that time, I think too much damage had been done.”