This time, Batavia survives opener

Batavia's Ian Brunton scores ahead of a throw to West Aurora's Kyle Spooner.
(Mary Beth Nolan/For the Beacon News)

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The past two postseasons, the end has been harsh for Batavia's baseball team.

Two years ago, a higher-seeded Batavia squad was upset by West Aurora in the opener. Last year, a 12-inning loss in the opener made the finale even harder to swallow.

But this season, the No. 6 Bulldogs can rest easy as they reached the Class 4A Willowbrook Regional final with a 9-3 win over West Aurora Wednesday.

No. 3 seed Batavia, which set a new school record with its 27th win, will face the winner of Thursday's St. Charles North/Willowbrook game in Saturday's championship game at 11 a.m.

"Last year was a heartbreaker," Batavia winning pitcher Adam Karger said. "This year, to come out and win the first one was nice. We had a 16-game winning streak snapped Monday against Wheaton North, so we just wanted to come out here and get another winning streak started."

No. 18 seed West Aurora (13-21) was done in by its mistakes all day, and it started with the Bulldogs' first batter, Tim Scofield. Scofield ripped a shot into right field that was misplayed and he later scored on a Tim Drish groundout to open a 1-0 lead for Batavia (27-6).

West Aurora's Cory Walden led the second off with a solo home run, but Batavia's Jordan Coffey led off the bottom of the second with a single and was doubled in by Henry DuQue.

Joe Aguilar was then hit by a pitch in the third and singled in by Brian Krolikowski to open a 3-2 lead. Though that run was earned, another Blackhawks' mistake helped it score. Krolikowski hit a routine pop foul outside of first that dropped harmlessly and he recovered later in the at-bat to single in that run.

The Blackhawks tied the game back up in the fourth when Chris Richter doubled in Tony Gaffino and scored on a Kyle Spooner single.

But one of four errors in the game by West in the bottom of the inning led to the eventual game-winner, DuQue scoring on a Ryan Welter sacrifice fly.

"I guess it kind of started in the first with the first batter," West coach John Reeves said. "They're obviously a very good hitting team and if you give them more opportunities, you get Krolikowski to pop up to first base and it falls, then a base hit a couple pitches later drives in a run. We're a little disappointed on that. Just breaking down defensively. Kind of uncharacteristic of our season."

That helped Karger (9-0) settle in after a rocky start to the game. With the lead in tow, Karger cruised over the final three innings to remain perfect. He allowed two baserunners in the seventh, leading to a mound visit from coach Matt Holm, but struck out the side to end the game.

Karger struck out eight and walked one, while allowing three runs on four hits in the win.

"He hit 100 pitches, but he wanted to gut it out," Holm said. "I walked out there and he goes, 'I'm staying.' And I said, 'I know, just giving you a break.' He's all guts and he's got a live arm and he had a great game today."

Batavia broke the game open in the fifth with four unearned runs, taking advantage of three West Aurora errors. The big blow was a two-run double from Tyler Lindquist.