Benet’s schedule toughens them for playoffs

Updated: May 23, 2011 10:01PM

Despite coming into the postseason four games under the .500 mark, Benet took some solace in the fact playing a hard schedule is supposed to harden a team.

Energized by the second chance that the postseason represents, Benet came out with its guns blazing Monday.

Bolstered by a nine-run second inning, the ninth-seeded Redwings jumped ahead on No. 23 Joliet Central quickly en route to rolling to a 15-4, five-inning victory in a Class 4A Benet Regional Quarterfinal.

Led by senior center-fielder R.J. Gatto, five different Redwings recorded at least two RBI---Gatto, Chris Stout, Matt Dorsett, Sam Santa Maria and Zac Lewinski---as the Redwings notched a season-high 15 runs.

“We just did what we needed to do (Monday),” said Gatto, who has signed with the University of Chicago and went 2-for-3 with five RBI. (Joliet Central’s pitchers) came out throwing a lot of fastballs and we had just played St. Rita and St. Laurence. We’ve been used to a little better pitching.

“We just did what we needed to. Give everybody on the team credit. We all hit. We all swung at fastballs early in the count and got the job done.”

Responding from back-to-back losses to top-10 foes St. Rita and St. Laurence to close out the regular season, Benet (15-18-2) showed the benefits that come from playing the likes of St. Rita, St. Laurence and the Neuqua Valley Sectional’s No. 2 seed, Providence, which Benet narrowly lost to on April 9 by a score of 3-1 and could potentially see again on Saturday in the Class 4A Benet Regional Final.

But before focus can turn to the highly-touted Celtics, a second meeting with Hinsdale South, the seventh seed in the Neuqua Valley Sectional, awaits Thursday afternoon.

Eight days prior to their two-run loss to Providence, back on April 1, the Redwings earned a 6-4 victory over Hinsdale South.

“We gotta keep the ball low. They can hit a little bit,” Dorsett said of the Hornets. “We’ll see what happens.”

Eight Redwings had at least one hit, with Gatto, Santa Maria, Dorsett and Andrew Mogni all chipping in with two hits.

Benet’s offense pounded Joliet Central starter Josh Wojnarowski for 12 runs, seven earned, on nine hits in two-plus innings.

The first eight batters to come up to bat in the second for the Redwings reached base safely as Lewinski, Dorsett and Santa Maria all came through with two-run hits during the nine-run outburst.

After prompting Wojnarowski’s removal after loading the bases with nobody out in the third, Gatto greeted Steelmen reliever James McClelland with a grand slam to right-center.

“I think once we got a couple runs, it started to create a lot of momentum for us,” Benet coach Jeff Bonebrake said. “Other than that, you don’t want to play in a ‘play-in’ game, but at the same time you got a playoff game under your belt. That’s the way you got to look at it. We took care of business and hopefully this propels us to play a good game on Thursday.”

Nico Burzawa’s two-run homer in the third off Benet starter Bobby Hayes and a two-run bloop single in the seventh from Brandyn Smith represented all of the scoring for Joliet Central (6-26).

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