Providence survives early Neuqua punch

Updated: June 2, 2011 8:00PM

Three batters into Thursday’s semifinal game in the Class 4A Neuqua Valley Sectional, Providence senior right-hander Brandon Magallones was staring at a 2-0 deficit.

Three straight hits, some aggressive Neuqua baserunning, plus a boost provided by the home crowd, and things were looking iffy for the No. 2-seeded Celtics.

But once Magallones settled in, it was just a matter of Providence scoring enough runs to survive 5-2 and hurry off to graduation at the Rialto Square Theater in Joliet.

The Celtics advance into Saturday’s 10 a.m. sectional championship against Downers Grove South.

“I’ll tell you what, they came out and punched us in the mouth a bit,” Providence coach Mark Smith said. “That might have been a good thing for us.

“After the start, that was the Mags we expected to see.”

Magallones, who has signed with Northwestern, finished with 11 strikeouts and two walks. He allowed one hit — Nick Iarrobino’s fifth-inning double — the rest of the way.

“I try to pitch to contact and make them hit the ball all the time,” Magallones said. “I was a little off early; I might have been too hyped. But they hit the ball. They’re good. After the start, I calmed down and started to hit my spots.”

Providence (34-3) is toiling under the burden of expectation. The Celtics have been ranked among the state’s top teams all season. They have not been tearing the cover off the ball in the postseason, but a healthy dose of small ball saved the day.

Neuqua (25-11) entered the state’s deepest sectional as the No. 3 seed and was in position most of the afternoon to swing the upset behind junior right-hander Nick Blackburn, who had gone the distance to beat Lockport 7-3 Saturday in the title game of the Lockport Regional.

Blackburn was touched for two runs in the third inning, one unearned, that tied it 2-2, and fell behind 3-2 on Kevin DeFlilippis’ RBI single over a drawn-in infield in the fifth. Both innings were set up by sacrifice bunts from No. 9 hitter Dominic Olszta.

In the sixth inning, Providence built a cushion. With the bases loaded and two outs, Olszta hit a check-swing roller to shortstop on a 2-2 count and beat it out to make the score 4-2. DeFillipis was hit by a pitch to knock in the final run.

“Olszta did a good job with two strikes getting the bat on the ball, and their shortstop (Mike Bogar) almost made one heck of a play on it,” Smith said. “Had he done it, that would have been a huge momentum swing. But when you put the bat on the ball in high school ball, something usually happens.

“We learned early in the season that on a day like this when the ball is not going to carry, you have to win via small ball. We were 3-for-3 on sacrifice bunts today. We executed well.”

Sam Travis singled home the first run for Providence with two outs in the third and the tying run scored on the play when the ball was mishandled in the outfield.

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