The concept itself doesn’t seem too complicated and it’s one coaches tend to preach constantly.
You always have an opportunity to potentially help your team by just being able to put the ball in play.
Over the last two days, Naperville North has executed that plan to a ‘T.’
Once again utilizing a small-ball approach, with a couple big hits sprinkled in, Naperville North sprung yet another upset on crosstown rival Naperville Central.
As Matt Schwartz led the way – both on the mound and at the plate – the Huskies came away with a 6-4 DuPage Valley Conference victory on Saturday over the DVC-leading Redhawks.
After Matt Pillatsch threw a complete game on Friday in besting Ryan Eiermann, Schwartz went 5 2/3 innings for the Huskies (11-11, 9-8) and recorded three RBI.
Schwartz (4-3) scattered nine hits while giving up four runs – three earned – while fanning five.
“It was huge,” Schwartz said. “It was a game of (swings). We battled. We battled. I didn’t have my stuff on the mound. I just got through it.”
Schwartz’s two-run single up the middle in the second inning was set up by the first of six errors for the Redhawks – a throwing error on a Jack Whitley bunt.
One inning later, an error at first base led to a pair of Naperville North runs during a two-run third that featured a Matt Pillatsch sacrifice bunt.
A safety squeeze from Colin Rivard in the fourth greeted Redhawks’ reliever Liam Heath, coming in for Tyler Brinker, as the Huskies kept trying to make the Redhawk defense make plays.
“I think that’s huge. Huskies’ baseball, forever, has always revolved around the bunting game and it took a while,” Naperville North coach Carl Hunckler said. “But now the kids really understand how important it is.
“Coach (Mark) Lindo should be given credit for some of this because of the fact that he talked about, ‘Hey, listen. We’re not scoring runs. We got to start hitting-and-running, We got to start bunting-and-running. We got to do little things. We’re striking out way too much.’
“So it was right then and there. So we said, ‘This is what we’re going to do. I don’t care who you are in the lineup. I don’t care if you’re Christian Barczi hitting fourth. We’re looking to bunt.’ Any time we catch a guy back and that, we’re going to do some things. So one-through-nine, we got guys looking to bunt.”
A two-run second for Naperville Central (19-6, 13-4), highlighted by a Noah Cinzio solo homer, got Brinker back to square one.
But the Huskies’ ability to respond and get three runs in the next two innings – driving Brinker (2-1) from the game after three-plus innings proved too tough a hill for the Redhawks to climb.
“We didn’t make enough plays,” Naperville Central coach Mike Stock said. “We didn’t make enough plays. I still thought we competed at the plate. I thought we had a few good at-bats that maybe if it was (Friday), it’d be a little different.”
Schwartz and Whitley combined to keep a big uprising from occurring, with the help of some splendid defense.
Schwartz and catcher Christian Barczi executed a pair of strike him out, throw him out double plays while Schwartz rolled a 4-6-3 double play in the sixth with the bases loaded.
“All day, we just needed to fight through the mistakes and we needed to get the momentum back,” Barczi said, “because some of those – they were gaining momentum, getting those runs. We only had a few runs lead. But those plays were huge because it just got the momentum back on our side and it really propelled us the rest of the game.”
With Whitley trying to work out of trouble, Pillatsch’s ability to track down a long fly ball off Conor Joyce’s bat in center ended the sixth while leaving the potential tying runs on base.
Schwartz might have said it best when describing the Huskies’ second victory over the Redhawks in as many days.
“Defense made a lot of plays,” he said. “That was great to see.”
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