Baseball: Marian ousts Lincoln-Way West
By Dick Goss dgoss@stmedianetwork.com June 2, 2012 10:04PM
Marian Catholic winning pitcher Brett Lilek is mobbed by teammates after an 11-2 victory over Lincoln-Way West on Saturday. | Larry Kane~For Sun-Times Media
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Updated: August 2, 2012 1:16AM
When Marian Catholic senior left-hander Brett Lilek warmed up in the bullpen before Saturday’s Class 3A Lincoln-Way West Sectional championship game against the Warriors, something was amiss.
“The ball was moving all over the place in the pen,” he said. “Fortunately, I got it corrected on the mound.”
Lilek, who shut out Illiana Christian for a regional title a week earlier, allowed three hits and two unearned runs while striking out a season-high 15 in pitching the Spartans to an 11-2 victory and a berth in Monday’s 5 p.m. supersectional against Simeon at Standard Bank Stadium in Crestwood.
An Arizona State recruit whose name may be called in this week’s Major League Baseball draft, Lilek lost his shutout bid in the top of the fourth when West’s No. 9 hitter, Nick Andrade, poked a two-out, two-run single to tie the game 2-2. Andrade also delivered a clutch two-run single Wednesday in the Warriors’ 3-0 semifinal win over Joliet Catholic.
“Another big hit there by Nick,” West coach Jake Zajc said. “But all day we just gave them too many free runners. They got key hits and their pitcher (Lilek) was excellent.”
“I was able to throw the fastball inside all day and located the slider,” Lilek said. “That kept them off balance.”
Lilek threw 115 pitches. After Andrade’s two-run single, he retired the last 10 hitters, six on strikeouts.
After No. 6 seed West (24-14) drew even at 2, No. 5 Marian (22-17) rebounded with a four-spot in the bottom of the fourth. The Spartans loaded the bases on a hit batsman and two walks against Warriors junior left-hander Ryan Novak. Devin Pickett ripped a two-run single, Brad Bohlen lined a sacrifice fly and Patrick Schmidt launched a gound-rule double to make it 6-2.
Marian bunched five more hits, including Brent Feldner’s two-run double, RBI doubles by Bohlen and Mitchell Weissenhofer and Eric Callaghan’s run-scoring single, in a five-run sixth. Patrick Swanson, who scored four times, hit his third single of the game in the inning.
“We had a nice run at the end of the year,” Zajc said. “We won big games against two good teams (Lemont and Joliet Catholic), and that gave our kids some confidence. What happened today, you just have to give them credit.”
