South Elgin wins on blooper 

Updated: April 27, 2011 11:01AM

South Elgin’s Kenny Lowden took a Mike Murphy two-strike pitch just off his hands and floated it toward first base, barely getting any part of his bat on it as the left-handed Murphy had pounded the ball hard inside on his fists. The ball kept drifting however, and Waubonsie Valley first baseman James Palasz quickly realized it was about to carry too far.

The Storm’s Dillon Gardner was off and running from second base on the two-out bloop and sure enough, the ball fell just over the reach of Palasz and in front of closing right fielder Kyle Limanowski and second baseman Nick Stefani.

Gardner’s run was the winner, giving South Elgin a 4-3 victory over Waubonsie Tuesday afternoon in Aurora, as the game was forced to Waubonsie because of poor field conditions at South Elgin.

“It’s the kind of season we’ve been having,” Warriors coach Dan Fezzuoglio said. “That’s been our year and that’s why we’re 5-9. ‘Murph’ pitched great. We hit some balls hard, but once again, we need to do a better job offensively.”

It was a bitter end of a complete game, five-hit outing for Murphy, who struck out nine and allowed two earned runs.

“It’s rough. I made a pretty good pitch and jammed him, but when you’re 5-9 you don’t get the breaks so we’ve just got to fight through everything,” Murphy said. “It’s a tough way to end the game.”

Murphy, who drove in two runs for the Warriors (5-9, 3-5), had kept the Storm (11-3-1, 6-3-1) from mounting any sort of real offensive threat for three innings until Andrew Weedman turned on a first pitch offering and put it over the center field fence for a two-run home run to make it 3-2 Storm.

“I put it outside, he put a good swing on the ball and it just flew out with the wind,” Murphy said. “Just tip your hat to him.”

Murphy’s counterpart, fellow lefty Chris Bingham, made his first start of the year for South Elgin and scattered six hits over seven innings. The sophomore was picked up defensively in the top of the seventh when shortstop John Menken turned an unassisted double play to end a Waubonsie threat.

“He’s a big, strong, strapping kid,” Storm coach Jim Kating said. “It’s nice to see our program going in that direction. That’s due to my coaches down below working on things we need up here and Chris is an example. These kids can pitch, they like competition, and they like challenges and they’re meeting them.”

Menken, who reached base three times and scored a run, injured his right foot late in the game and was noticeably limping, but it did not prevent him from making a diving stab on a hard hit ball by Palasz up the middle.

The play wiped out Nick Stefani (double, RBI), who had reached on a fielder’s choice following a botched sacrifice attempt.

“Our execution wasn’t the greatest at times,” Fezzuoglio said. “That makes that whole play. If we get a guy at second and he hits it hard, (Menken) is in a different spot on the infield. That’s what it comes down to.”

© 2012 Sun-Times Media, LLC. All rights reserved. This material may not be copied or distributed without permission. For more information about reprints and permissions, visit www.suntimesreprints.com. To order a reprint of this article, click here.