By Bobby Narang- Photos by Renee Kaspar
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LISLE – Two days after concluding a six-game tournament in suburban Milwaukee, the 12U Illinois-Lisle Wolves youth baseball team returned to the comforts of home.
After losing the title game of The Rock Youth Baseball Tournament, the Wolves replaced their smug and disappointed faces with smiles.
Not even a 15-minute delay to the start of Tuesday’s game seemed to bother the Wolves. The Wolves were all smiles in the pregame, joking around with each other in the dugout and playfully jostling between each other until the game started.
The comfort level extended onto the diamond, with the Wolves scoring four runs in the each of the first two innings to cruise to a 12-2 victory over the Fury Gold.
The Wolves (34-11-2) shrugged off Sunday night’s title game loss from the first pitch, getting quality pitching, powerful swings and good fielding to return to the win column.
“This team when they have fun, they seem to play well,” Illinois Wolves coach Brandin Muniz said. “That’s the key with them. They have to have fun and swing the bat. That combination seems to always be successful.
The Wolves came out of the gates with an aggressive attitude, looking to make quick work of their opponent. Muniz said it was a stark contrast to Sunday’s championship game, when his players had their heads down and lacked energy.
“The kids were aggressive hitting, so when that happens we’re hard to beat because of our pitching,” Muniz said. “When the games we don’t have a lot of hits, it’s usually our pitching that carries us over the hump. Today we hit the ball, so we had a really good game.”
The Wolves smacked two home runs to create an early firework show. Ironically, both home runs came on the first pitch, with Christian Slazak drilling a two-run blast in the bottom of the first.
Michael Petrbok closed out the game in style, with a walk-off three-run home run on the first pitch over the fence in the bottom of the fourth inning. The Wolves spread the wealth at the plate, with eight players getting at least one hit to compile a total of 13 hits.
Leadoff hitter Johnny Burke sparked the attack with a 2-for-3 effort with two RBIs and three runs scored. Petrbok was on fire, finishing 3-for-3 with five RBIs and three runs scored. Slazak had one hit and two RBIs, both coming on his epic blast.
Griff Sinkovich joined the hit parade with a 2-for-2 night with a run scored. Eamon Muldoon charged the lineup with two hits in two at-bats and drove in two runs. His strong showing at the plate from near the bottom of the order was a key factor in the blowout win.
Petrbok said his homer was the ideal way to end a game, sailing over the right-center field fence.
“That (homer) felt good because I was due for one,” Petrbok said. “I almost hit one earlier in the game, but I really felt the barrel on the home run. I can’t remember the last time I got a (walk-off) maybe last year. I was really thinking to hit a home run to end the game.
“This win feels good after Sunday. It helped me to start of the game hitting and Tyler pitched great on the mound. We wanted to win this.”
Slazak, who suffered the loss in Sunday’s championship game, took out some of his frustrations by powering a monster home run in the middle of a four-run first inning to give the Wolves some confidence and momentum.
Slazak connected on the first pitch, noting the entire team was playing aggressive following Sunday’s passive showing in their defeat.
“Our team had a tough game on Sunday with errors,” Slazak said. “This was great to win the game. I got injured in the first inning but came back. I barely swung on that (home run). We were swinging on a lot of first pitches and made good contact.”
The Wolves set the tone at the plate and on the mound thanks to a strong pitching performer from starter Tyler Sokolnicki. The right-hander never let the Fury get its offense in gear, slamming the door on them to pitch three solid innings. He allowed a run in the top of the first inning but closed out the threat with a strikeout. He came out strong in the second inning, setting the Fury down in order to set up a four-run bottom frame by his team that seized control of the game. Burke sparked the offense in the second inning with a RBI single to deep right field for a 5-1 lead. Petrbok followed with a first-pitch double over the centerfielder’s head that scored two runs to increase the lead to 7-1.
Sokolnicki said the Wolves’ played a big role in his strong three-inning performance. Sinkovich gave up one run in the fourth inning in relief.
“I didn’t feel great velocity but my control felt good,” Sokolnicki said. “It was tough with some of the calls, but I liked the umpire. For me, getting a strong start is good, like getting the first guy out. That helps me a lot.
“I’ve pitched well against this team before, so that helped me today. It felt really good to win this game, just to help Christian out since he felt really bad after our championship loss. Scoring runs early helped me so much, having us score early kept me going.”
Muniz said his team struggled in two previous games against the Fury, partly because of bad pitching matchups. He said Sokolnicki kept the visitors in check during his start.
“We played them two times prior to today, but we hadn’t thrown somebody from our starting rotation yet because of the way our schedule worked out,” Muniz said. “We either had a tournament going in, or the day after. We always seemed to catch them at a bad time. We didn’t have that problem today, so I wanted them to see someone from our starting rotation and it showed.”
