O'Fallon's homers ground Redhawks

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A pair of solo home runs stood up as O’Fallon defeated Naperville Central 2-1 Monday in a Class 4A supersectional Monday at Illinois Wesleyan.

Nick Johnson took a full-count pitch the opposite way for a homer to left with two outs in the top of the fourth to give O’Fallon (31-9) the lead for good.

“I’m real proud of the way we played,” Naperville Central pticher Pat Kaminska said. “There were just a couple of mistakes on my part and they took advantage of them.”

Naperville Central (24-15) scored in the bottom of the first. Ben Lucas had a leadoff single and scored when Nick Linne’s sacrifice was thrown to the right-field corner.

Matt Soria was 2-for-3 for the Redhawks, who were limited to three hits by O’Fallon pitcher Miles Quintal (10-2).

Kaminska (6-3) went the distance, striking out seven, walking none and allowing five hits.

Nick Tindell blasted a leadoff homer in the top of the second on a full-count pitch to put the Panthers on the board.

The Redhawks had a scoring opportunity in the bottom of the fifth with Soria on second and Lucas on first with one out. But the inning ended on a double play when Quintal struck out Linne and Lucas was picked off first.

"It was disappointing because there was no reason for it," Redhawks coach Bill Seiple said of the double play.

"But give them credit. We just didn't swing the bats. We knew one run wasn't going to win the game and Pat did everything we wanted him to."

The Redhawks' playoff run didn't surprise Kaminska.

"I've always had confidence that we were going to be a team than would do well in the tournament," he said. "We started playing well in midseason and today we came out and played error-free ball. You couldn't ask for more."